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11 




REV. BARZ1LLIA SILKWOOD. 



Steps in the Christian Life 



TOGETHER WITH 



Life Sketch, Sayings, and Sermons 



By 
REV. BARZILLIA SILKWOOD 



» 



Cincinnati : 
PEESS OF JENNINGS AND GRAHAM 






Copyright, 1910, 
By Barzillia Silkwood. 



©CIA27391-I6 



I Dedicate This Book to the Memory of My 
Sainted Father and Mother, 

€lnm ttnb HLkxiziitm ^3ftlktaro& 

Who, by Their United Efforts in Discipline, Precept, 
and Example, Were Enabled to Rear a Family 
of Two Girls and Six Boys to Womanhood 
and Manhood, All of Whom Are Still 
Living, and Hold the Names of Their 
Parents in Fond Remembrance for 
Their Lessons Taught and the 
Christian Influence Exer- 
cised in Molding Their 
Children's Lives. 



'IamtbeHlnrigbty0od: COalk 
before Me, and be tbou perfect," 

-Gen. 17: 






CONTENTS. 

Page 

Preface, - . 7 

Life Sketch, 9 

part L 

Eepentance, 13 

What Is Conversion? 15 

What Is Regeneration? 17 

What Is Adoption, 20 

What Is Reconciliation? - - - - 21 

What Is Justification ? 22 

Natural Sin in the Heart, - - - - 24 

What Is Pardon? 27 

Growth in Grace, 31 

Holiness Imperative, 35 

What Sancitification Does, - - - - 36 

Will We Have Temptation ? 37 

What Is Baptism ? 40 

part II. 

The Diagram, - 44 

First Road — Sin, Sinning, - - - - 45 

The Associations on this Road of Life, - 51 

5 



CONTENTS. 

Page 

Second Eoad — Variable, - - - - 56 

Third Eoad— " High way of Holiness," - - 60 

Part III. 

Some Truths Compared, -" - - 69 

Sermon on Consecration, - - - - 70 

Some Unreasonable Things, 74 

Some Sayings, 75 

Part IV. 

The Economic Value of the Bible in Civil 

Government, 78 

Health and Longevity, - 82 

The Modern Dance, 84 

Let Us Eeason Together, ----- 89 



PREFACE. 

Dear Christian Eeaders: The desire of the 
writer of these pages is to meet a long-felt need; to 
set forth some truths that will be helpful to those 
who are seeking after light, especially the new con- 
vert, and to those who have been longer in the Chris- 
tian life, but who seem not to understand that there 
are specific steps to be recognized in the Christian 
character-building. We have often been called upon 
to witness the sad calamity that is prevalent in so 
many falling by the way who have made a start in 
the Christian life. There must be real and serious 
causes for this, and to seek to show what I believe to 
be the true cause, and to point out a preventive, is 
the desire of the writer. 

While these convictions of duty have been with 
me for many years, I have never essayed to explain 
them in print before. Neither would I now attempt 
to do so, did I not feel that the office of the Holy 
Ghost needs to be definitely brought before the mind 
of the seeker in the different steps or degrees of grace. 

7 



PEEFACE. 

Believing that the Holy One is with me, inspiring 
conviction and giving me light by His presence as I 
write, if in these pages I may be able, by His help, to 
prevent some soul from making the sad failure that 
myself and very many others have made by being ig- 
norant of their privilege in taking the essential steps 
that insure success by the help and power of the Holy 
Ghost, the writer will feel repaid in his effort. 

I dedicate this book, in its mission of helpfulness 
and light, to the care and direction of the Triune God, 

whose I am and whom I serve. 

B. Silkwood. 
Lacota, Mich., January 5, 1910. 



LIFE SKETCH. 

I was born on the thirteenth day of December, 
1852, on a farm in Paradise Prairie, Perry County, 
Illinois. I was baptized in infancy, and reared by 
Christian parents, who required their children to 
attend Church and Sabbath School from their earliest 
years. There were seven boys and two girls in the 
family. The eldest, a brother, died at the age of 
seventeen years, of typhoid fever. There were also 
half brothers and sisters from a previous marriage. 
I, with some of the neighboring children, attended 
revival meetings, and was led to give my heart to 
Christ in my thirteenth year. With me, this was 
to give myself fully to Christ and trust Him as my 
Savior. I do not remember that there was on this 
occasion an impressive feeling of repentance, but I 
was brought into sweet fellowship with my Savior 
through the Spirit, and in time had many blessed, 
heavenly experiences. But by not comprehending 
the dual or carnal nature, and not being properly 
instructed in reference to that nature within, nor the 
remedy for my deficiency, like multitudes of other 
young Christians, I was left to battle with my igno- 
rance and inexperience, and to contend against an 
enemy who molded this nature at his will. Thus, as 
years came and went, I had a sore conflict with self 

9 



LIFE SKETCH. 

and Satan, and an up-and-down experience. The 
Holy Ghost was so grieved that He left me for some 
four years, and no one can know how sorrowful was 
the time but those in a like condition. You will 
find an illustration of this sad state set forth in 
John 15: 6. 

While in this condition the devil would taunt me 
with the fact that from my birth I was intended to 
be a preacher, but was a failure. He would tempt and 
revile me in various ways, and at times would whisper 
that I was then a good enough Christian, hoping to 
get me to so decide that he might keep me under 
bondage. 

I had been a member of the Church all these 
years and desired to be a true Christian, and my out- 
ward life was so blameless that I was elected as 
Sabbath school superintendent, and served in that 
position for awhile, but nothing could be done for me 
in a spiritual way until the blessed Holy Spirit came 
to renew and inspire me with true life. 

About this time I went West. The Spirit came 
to me there with added grace and power; but I some- 
how felt that I was not all that I ought to be. One 
day, while at work in the field husking corn, suddenly 
as a clap of thunder out of a clear sky God smote me 
almost to the ground. I rushed immediately to the 
house, and for a number of days and nights I ex- 
perienced great anguish of soul, and would have been 
willing that this body should be consumed even in the 
flames of literal fire if I could but have peace of 
conscience. I did not get relief until, one afternoon, 

10 



LIFE SKETCH. 

it seemed that there was a real hand, or some power 
within, pressing my soul from the body, and the 
earth seemed to be opening under my feet to devour 
me, when the strange power was stayed. 

The next day there was a funeral at our home 
Church in Garden Grove, California. I attended, and 
while the deceased was lying in state in front of the 
rostrum, and the choir was singing that sweet hymn 
(sweet to every Christian, and especially to me since 
my late experience), 

"Asleep in Jesus—blessed sleep, 
From which none ever wake to weep," — 

the Holy Spirit came to me, and gave me the witness 
that if I were in the place of the deceased all would 
be well with my soul. I was then made happy in 
His love and fellowship, and determined that heaven 
should be my home, cost what it would in trial on 
this earth. I used all available means to grow in 
grace from that time. 

One day, in the spring of 1880, I was providen- 
tially led to the house of a neighbor, where I met a 
good brother who, a short time before, had entered 
into the experience of sanctification. He told how he 
had made the consecration, and explained the dif- 
ference in the two experiences — conversion and sanc- 
tification. I said, "That is what I need, what I 
have been looking for, and I am going to seek for 
it* I felt in my heart that the Lord would give me 
just what I needed, in His own way, and I was willing 
to so take it or receive it. I went home and began 

11 



LIFE SKETCH. 

to pray, and to consecrate myself as best I could, 
according to Eomans 12 : 1, 2. The next day at noon 

I entered the house for dinner wife was not at 

home that day — and sat down to eat my meal, but I 
was more desirous of heavenly manna, and instead of 
eating my dinner I knelt on the floor, and prayed 
the Lord to send the baptism of the Holy Ghost, and 
it came in wonderful power of cleansing and filling. 
This was distinctly different from any blessing I had 
ever received before. Some may say, "Why did you 
receive it so soon, while others labor in prayer for a 
long period of time ?" I will repeat what one has said 
in reference to another case, "I was ripe for the 
filling." 

So, dear reader, my life has been much more satis- 
factory to myself, and I know it has been to the Lord, 
since receiving my Pentecost. I have reason to believe 
that my case, while different in some respects, is simi* 
lar in many another to those of the young Christian 
who has passed the ordeal. I have good reasons to be- 
lieve that had I been instructed properly in regard 
to full and complete sanctification for the baptism 
of the Holy Ghost, my early Christian life would have 
been different. 

That this testimony, in sending forth my book 
on its mission, may be a help to many struggling souls 
is my earnest prayer. 

B. Silkwood. 



12 



Steps in the Christian Life. 



Part I. 
REPENTANCE. 

"The sorrow of this world worketh death; but 
godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation that 
need not be repented of," The first thing a person 
should do before calling a physician, is to know that 
he is in need of one because of the presence of some 
malady. Thus with the sinner. He is first to know 
that he is a sinner, and can not quit sinning as long as 
he has a sinful nature. Next he is to seek to be rid 
of the sins of his life. When he realizes that he is 
sinning against the decrees of a righteous Father and 
a tender, sympathizing, sinless Savior, the knowledge 
should stir his heart with a great sorrow, — not that 
he has merely done wrong against himself or his 
neighbor, but that he has offended a righteous God 
♦in violating the law of One who has done so much 
for his benefit. This conviction should and does 
work in repentance toward God, his Father, and leads 
him to believe on His Son who died on the cross in 
his stead ; and a living faith in Jesus Christ on the 

13 



. STEPS IN" THE CHKISTIANT LIFE. 

cross brings pardon and peace, followed by conversion, 
regeneration, and adoption. These three are simulta- 
neous, immediately succeeding pardon and peace. 

Conversion changes our relation, both outward 
and inward, toward God, men, and things. 

Regeneration is a change of soul power from a 
dead state to a living spiritual state, receiving back 
that which was lost in the inherited state of the fall 
of our first parents. 

Adoption is replacing us into the family of God, 
after conviction while in the service of sin and Satan. 
We originally belonged to God's family, but declined 
therefrom and associated with the children of dark- 
ness. Through the regenerating power of God's 
Spirit, we are once more fitted for the fellowship of 
God and those who are of the household of faith. 
These works of grace bring a person into the justified 
state. 

As soon as we are justified and become conscious 
of a dual nature within — that is, when we discover 
the willful, carnal nature within, and are led to see 
that it is our duty as well as privilege to make a full 
and complete consecration for cleansing, and the en- 
dowment of power by the outpouring of the Holy 
Ghost, it becomes us then to follow the dictates of 
duty. Then honor the Spirit by testifying to what 
has been done. 

There are two all-important steps that should be 
taken by every sinner. The first, as soon as he realizes 
that he is a sinner, is to repent and turn to God with 
all the power of his soul and demand salvation from 

14 



EEPENTAKCE. 

his sins. The next, as soon as he finds the willful, 
carnal nature stirring within, is to make a full con- 
secration for the cleansing and filling by the Holy 
Ghost. There is no time so opportune as when we 
first realize our need. 

I am so thankful that I obeyed the heavenly call 
to seek for a clean heart the first time it was presented 
to me as my privilege through consecration and faith. 
I received my Pentecost in about twenty-four hours 
from the time I recognized it as my privilege to do so. 
Glory be to His holy and matchless name! "His 
name shall be called Jesus, because He shall save His 
people from their sins." 

WHAT IS CONVERSION? 

There are a number of characteristics that are 
necessarily associated with conversion, but are not 
conversion. Hence they may severally, or more than 
one combined, be mistaken for conversion by the 
seeker after a new life. The object of the writer is to 
so separate them and associate the one with the other 
in the relation which they hold to each other in con- 
version, that the seeker after truth may not mistake 
the one for the other. 

What is conversion? It is the change from one 
line of thought and action to another. Moody says it 
i9 "a facing about," turning in another direction. It 
is the decision on one's part to change his way of 
thinking, and this change of thinking, if persisted in, 
will lead to a change of life. But a man must be con- 

15 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

verted in mind and will before he is converted in soul 
and has a change of heart. That is, he changes his 
mind and will when he decides to abandon his sinful 
habits. There may be a longer or a shorter period, 
according to the nature of the case, between the time 
when he decides to change his life while seeking in 
prayer and repentance, and the time when he is able 
to look steadfastly upon the cross and receive the 
experience of John Bunyan, who in his own vivid 
words saw the cross, and at the sight of it his burden 
fell off. A person may make the mistake at thinking 
that the mind and the accomplishment of the purpose 
are one, and so not persist long and earnestly enough 
to receive a change of heart. The change of heart 
must follow the action of the mind and will. Christ 
says, "Ye must be born again/' indicating a sense of 
the presence of sin and a need of pardon that will pro- 
duce the repentance that "need not be repented of/' a 
"godly sorrow for sin; an abhorrence at the thought 
of it ; to be sick of sin," and all its influences. If re- 
pentance is not deep enough to drive us to the Savior 
to plead in prayer and confession, "which is good for 
the soul/' it may be often a means to lead us out of 
our pent-up condition on account of sin's curbing and 
cramping the soul's power so there is possibility for 
the seeker, whether in youth or riper years. But he 
is young in the life of seeking if he be just starting 
upon the royal road to the heavenly city, "whose 
Maker and Builder is God," being mistaken in taking 
repentance for conversion. 

Conversion, regeneration, and adoption are simul- 
16 



EEPENTANCE. 

taneous in their operation, and are the result of the 
work of the "Holy Spirit" upon the soul in answer 
to faith in the atonement, making real in the soul that 
which was made possible on the cross nineteen hun- 
dred years ago." (John 3:16; 16:8-10.) 

WHAT IS REGENERATION? 

To generate, to produce something from its be- 
ginning; to produce life is to generate life, and to re- 
generate spiritual life is to produce that which was 
lost in the fall of man through disobedience, which 
brought sin and death into the world. A knowledge 
of sin causes a person to repent and believe on Jesus 
Christ, who died on the cross to take away the sins of 
this life. Eead John's words, "Behold the Lamb of 
God who taketh away the sins of the world !" In 
answer to such faith the Holy Spirit makes real the 
virtue of the atonement by regenerating the soul that 
was dead and bringing it into spiritual life. Thus 
the subject receives back to conscious life that which 
was dead through the effects of sin, — a regeneration 
of the soul's powers. Once the subject was spiritually 
dead; now he is consciously alive to God, and man, 
and things — the things he once fed upon, and which 
produced death in his soul and mind. As sin is a 
foreign element in the human life and did not origi- 
nate in the creation of man, but was brought about by 
an enemy of God and man, Satan, who had refused to 
be subject to God's government, and rebelled against 
His power, aiming to damage His influence if possible 
2 17 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

and to inflict his spite upon God's creature by de- 
ceiving our first parents, persuading them to doubt 
God and to disobey Him, which brought spiritual 
death, so regeneration arouses to a new field of action 
and restores that which was lost through sin. The 
subject becomes alive to the sense of his duty toward 
God and man, and began to hunger and thirst after 
the right food and drink. He finds comfort in prayer 
and in the study of God's holy Word. He feeds upon 
the bread and drinks the water that satisfies the 
hunger and thirst of his soul; he lives in a new realm, 
a life from above, and hence the necessity of spiritual 
food and drink. He had been feeding upon sinful 
and carnal things that no longer satisfied, and his soul 
now desires and needs heavenly manna. 

In the larger sense, taking in the moral quality 
that led up to it, conversion is changing his relation to 
God, men, and things. If he has been a frequenter of 
the card table he goes there no more, but becomes an 
attendant upon God's table. If he has been a fre- 
quenter of the ball room he goes there no more, but 
the prayer and the class room are his familiar guides. 
If he has been a disturber of the peace of the com- 
munity or of his own home, that course of life is aban- 
doned, and he becomes a peacemaker wherever he 
may go, his words are "seasoned with grace/' and he 
is known to praise God with his voice. If he has been 
a chronic borrower and debt contracter, taking pains 
to accumulate debts, he forsakes this way of life, and 
begins to pay up all he owes even from old time 

Zaccheus made a true confesbion ; go thou and do 
18 



KEPENTANCE. 

likewise. (St. Luke 16:8.) Some one may say, "I 
am not able; Zaccheus was rich, and could do so." 
And so can you. The requirement is but just a will- 
ing mind; God does not demand impossibilities. If 
you should be in the sad condition of the sinner de- 
scribed, do all you can to make right the wrong, 
asking the Lord to help you and lead you to do so as 
He prospers you, and show your willingness by 
making a confession to the injured party, who may be 
moved to forgive you all indebtedness to himself. 
If not, he will surely be lenient when he sees you are 
sincere. 

Sometimes the Holy Spirit regenerates the soul; 
then He leads the person to right whatsoever wrong 
he has committed toward his fellows; but there are 
cases where this course is not demanded. Some 
seekers proceed to a certain point in their dealings 
with God at the altar, and then are apparently held 
in suspense until confession is made and the penitent 
sees his way clear to do all the Holy Spirit requires 
of him. Under some conditions, however, peace never 
comes from lack of obedience on the part of the 
penitent when the Holy Spirit points out the thing 
He sees must be put away; or from a fear in the 
seeker's mind that some hidden deed will come to 
light. He goes from that altar and continues in his 
darkness rather than let the Spirit lead him into the 
light of sins pardoned. 

Now, dear reader, I wish to say that the motive of 
the Spirit is not to be harsh ; neither does He intend 
to make the burden hard to bear ; but knowing what 

19 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

is really necessary for our best interest, He will re- 
lieve us of all possible burdens in our effort to make 
right the wrong. Troubling thoughts occupy the 
minds of some, — what they think would be required 
of them if they should become Christians. For in- 
stance, an acquaintance of mine was deceived for 
years with the thought that if she became a Chris- 
tian, she would have to join the Salvation Army. 
After years of loss she finally gave her heart to the 
Lord, and instead of joining the Salvation Army, she 
was joined to a noble Christian young man, and they 
settled down in a home in their community, and are 
still living there, with a family of children to brighten 
their lives. 

Satan is always going about to deceive the sinner 
or penitent with some false suggestion to rob him of 
the peace the good Lord is able to bring into his life 
if he would only believe on Him for salvation. 

A person receives conversion when his whole 
being — mind, will, and soul — is cast over upon the 
virtue of Christ's shed blood, by faith in which the 
Holy Spirit uplifts the soul, changing it from nature 
to grace, when peace enters to rule and flow as a river. 

WHAT IS ADOPTION? 

"When the seeker is brought into the new life he is 
brought into a new relation to his Savior. He is no 
longer to serve Satan and sin, but God his Savior; 
hence his associations are to be different. With this 
new experience he feels that he is God's child by the 

20 



EEPENTANCE. 

Holy Spirit bearing witness to his adoption into the 
family of God. Hence he can look up and own Him 
as his Father, and recognize the saints as his brethren. 
Once a child of Satan, he is now a child of God ; once 
a subject of "Satan's kingdom, which will come to an 
end," he is now a subject of Christ's Kingdom, which 
has no end. (Isaiah 9 : 6, 7.) Once he was ill at ease 
in the company of God's children, now he enjoys their 
company and fellowship. Once he was the prodigal 
son without a home, and with no food but the husks 
of the corn that he was giving to the swine. But he 
has come to himself at last, and turned his feet into 
the path which leads to his Father's home, where there 
is plenty and to spare. He has been taken back into 
the family of God to enjoy all the privileges of that 
home. 

WHAT IS RECONCILIATION? 

It is to be made friends again. Sin had brought 
enmity between man and God, and God was sorry for 
man. So He planned a means by which it might be 
possible for the offender to return to the offended 
Father. He sent His Son to redeem the world 
through the shedding of His blood on the cruel cross, 
that man, through repentance toward God the Father 
and faith in the crucified Christ, might be taken into 
the friendship of God again. The Father was recon- 
ciled to the world in anticipation when He planned 
the redemption, and when all, under the Old Testa- 
ment dispensations, came in penitence and looked for 

21 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAX LIFE. 

the atonement through the promised Messiah. They 
were acceptable to the Father, as we are who look 
back to the cross for the remission of our sins. 

There God exhibited His love for the world, and 
gave the token and visible signs of His friendship 
for those who had offended Him, by sending His Son 
to show men the mind of the Father. His great in- 
terest in the children of men could not be more con- 
vincingly displayed than by giving His greatest gift, 
even His only Son, to toil laboriously and suffer as a 
pauper, having no home as His own, but sharing with 
His friends in their humble ways of life. Thus did 
the Son reconcile the world to the Father through His 
life and death, and now the Father sending forth His 
messengers to call attention to the fact of God's 
willingness to forgive and become a Friend to the 
sinner when he accepts the atonement. In the life 
and death and resurrection of Christ the way is found 
to resurrect the sinner from his death of sin to a life 
in Christ Jesus. 

WHAT IS JUSTIFICATION? 

It is in right living, walking in the light as man 
sees it, and praying for more. A person is justified 
in every step he takes while he is seeking to "flee the 
wrath to come." He is justified in the course he 
pursues when he seeks pardon and regeneration. If 
he is sincere and willing to be led and instructed by 
proper advice under the light of the Holy Spirit, and 
every step he takes in this way of seeking leads him to 

22 



EEPENTANCE. 

the important act, that of faith in Christ as the One 
who suffered in his stead and for whose sake the 
Father pardons all his sins and removes them all from 
sight to be remembered no more forever, then he is 
brought in to the state of justification in the fullest 
sense. Thus a person who has been pardoned and 
adopted into the family of God is a living example of 
the justified. 

But what relation does justification hold to the 
unregenerate state and to the state of sanetification ? 
Is any part of the sinful life carried over ? Is all the 
sin nature destroyed in the soul at conversion, or does 
carnality continue in the heart of the young convert ? 
Paul, writing to the Corinthian Church, addresses 
them as carnal, as babes in Christ. (1 Cor. 3:1, 2.) 
In his letter to the Eoman Church he speaks of the 
carnal mind as "not subject to the law of God, neither 
can be." And why ? Because it is of Satan its father. 
Paul also calls it the "old man" and the "body of sin." 
The great majority of Christians testify to a bondage 
to sin, or the root of sin remaining after conversion, 
which they say needs to be kept under ; but in an un- 
guarded moment the imperfection is made manifest 
to their shame, hindering their freedom in Christian 
action, troubling in many ways the peace of the 
Church and the individual lives of its members. The 
reader will remember that the writer called attention 
in his Preface to the fact that there must be a cause 
for the sad spectacle of imperfection among the young 
converts, the lambs of the flock; so many sick, so 
many lame and weak, pining with the malady of sin 

23 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

nature. They do not comprehend the reason for this, 
and alas! too many preachers and teachers are as 
much at a loss to understand the mystery. They are 
not able to remedy the evil, because they have not 
themselves traveled the path on which they should 
be perfect guides ; they lack the experience that makes 
leaders and true teachers. 

NATURAL SIN IN THE HEART. 

"We will all have to acknowledge the fact that 
there is some great and main cause for the serious 
loss of our new converts/' The question naturally 
arises, Is there no way of preventing this? Well, 
we do not believe that any means that may be used 
will insure the stability of all who start in the Chris- 
tian life. Our Savior, in His parable of the sower 
who went out to sow, teaches us this lesson: "Some 
seed fell by the wayside, some on stony ground, some 
among thorns, and some on good ground." So 
various are the souls who receive the seed, so different 
the environments surrounding the young life of the 
Christian. With all the unfavorable conditions if 
there is innate disability or sin nature still in the 
Christian's heart that it is possible to remove, which 
still remaining is a hindrance to Christian advance- 
ment, to find some remedy is mainly what has 
prompted the writer to produce this book under the 
direction of the Holy Spirit, in whom I live and 
whom I wish to honor. Bather let Him honor me as 
a channel through whom He may bring His mind 

24 



REPENTANCE. 

before the reader of this book, and show that there 
is in the economy of grace a great help to prevent 
young converts from falling, carrying heart and 
soul forward to God's altar, where Christ Jesus will 
cleanse from all inbred sin. 

What caused the first transgression in every hu- 
man life ? Was it something from without or from 
within? David said that he was "conceived in sin 
by his mother." How long after a child is born be- 
fore we can detect the movement of a sinf ul, willful 
nature ? According to David it was born with us, 
and began to display itself from our earliest breath. 
Then this willful, sinful nature began to grow and 
produce its kind. When the child begins to know 
what government means to itself, it begins to be- 
come conscious of right and wrong, and when this 
willful, sinful nature refuses to do the things it 
ought to do, or to do the things it believes it ought 
not to do, it begins to commit an actual transgres- 
sion. From that conscious act onward to a life of 
greater transgressions it lives, until happily, some 
day, it sees its sins in the light of God, and turns 
from them, is heartily sorry for them, prays to God 
for forgiveness, and is forgiven of every transgres- 
sion. Thus the young penitent is converted, regen- 
erated, and adopted into the family of God. He 
is happy in his new-made love, and expects to go 
on his way to heaven in bliss. But, alas! after 
a time there is a duty to perform; he somehow 
fails to do it, and sadness takes the place of happi- 
ness. Or the tempter comes and whispers something 

25 



STEPS m THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

to discourage him and there is a conflict within. 
With duty neglected, condemnation comes upon his 
soul. He does not understand this inner conflict, and 
is too backward to make it known to any one. Not 
comprehending his own heart nature he even fails to 
confess to the Lord, doubting that He is ready to for- 
give him, and forgive at once, and display the witness 
of his acceptance. 

Thus in his inexperience the young Christian 
often grows weak and faints by the way. Many 
beginners have not been properly taught the nature 
of the real condition. They are not aware that the 
roots of the sin life have not been entirely plucked 
from the heart at conversion; but the Holy Spirit 
is ever present to assist His children, and to either 
approve or disapprove the actions of their lives. 
When He sees they do something that is not good for 
young Christians, He brings sadness of heart; and 
when they gladly discharge some known Christian ob- 
ligation, He brings brightness and joy to their being. 
This is His means of leading them to greater victo- 
ries. (See John 16 : 10.) He takes Christ's place in 
directing our lives ; He knows just what we need, and 
points out what is commendable or otherwise. As 
Christ said, "He will take the things of Mine and 
make them known to you, His followers." The pre- 
ventive to spiritual falling off, to a large degree, is to 
teach young converts to take their hearts to the 
Master for cleansing. 



26 



EEPENTANCE. 
WHAT IS PARDON? 

The pardon for sins clears the record between the 
soul of the convert and his God, from the last trans- 
gression before conversion back to the first actual 
sin in his childhood days, but does not remove the 
sin of his life. Still the sin nature is left because 
it can not be forgiven, as it is a principle, a life — a 
sin life. In my old home, where I was born and 
brought up, we had some black locust trees in the 
yard, and I remember that the roots extended beyond 
the yard fence, and if left alone in the hither side 
of the fence where the earth was seldom disturbed the 
roots would sprout from the ground. I was led to 
dislike a tree that was so ready to sprout from the 
roots. A maple was different. Cut down a maple 
tree and the stump and roots will soon die. But if 
you desire trouble for years to come, cut down a 
black locust, the stump and roots will continue to 
send up sprouts. Just so is the nature of sin in the 
life of man. If the stump, or even a root is left, 
it is prolific of its kind. Nature is like the locust 
root, sin; and sin is like the devil grass of the West, 
which sprouts at every joint, and these joints are 
numerous. If this grass had the least encouragement 
with a little moisture and lying undisturbed on the 
ground, it will grow. Such is the nature of sin in 
the human heart. 

Actual transgressions are all forgiven or par- 
doned by God at conversion ; but the sin, the inherited 
principle, must be cleansed by virtue of the shed 

27 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

blood, and by a complete consecration for the bap- 
tism of the "Holy Ghost and fire." These are John 
Baptist's words, Matthew 3:11. 

My dear reader, let me impress this fact upon your 
mind regarding the roots of sin, that remain and 
are carried over into the state of justification; for I 
know some who will claim otherwise. The Church 
testifies to this truth by acknowledging that there is 
a disability in the life of the young Christian. Now, 
if there is a cause for such shortcoming in the Chris- 
tian life, either there must be a lack in the plan of 
"redemption" (for the word means to redeem from a 
lost state or to "buy back"), or we have failed to 
learn where the power is to carry us over these critical 
places in our Christian training and development. 
What pardon does is to place the convert just where 
he started before he committed the first actual trans- 
gression; except, of course, he has had the sad ex- 
perience of a sinful life. But he stands in the same 
relation to God as pertaining to his sins, as they are 
all taken away now. Before he committed one sin, 
he was not a sinner, but a creature, with sin nature 
undeveloped. Now he has had the sad experience of 
sin sowing and reaping, but is pardoned and justified 
through his faith in the atonement. What one of 
these states of life needed, the other also needed, as 
each overstands in the same relation to the Lord and 
Savior, with the seed or roots of sin in the heart. 

What did the child need in its innocency ? I will 
tell you what it needed through the virtue of the 
atonement, and under the light of the gospel of our 

28 



EEPENTANCE. 

Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It was entitled to a 
Christian birth and to Christian training; it was 
entitled to have its pure, innocent mind led in heart 
to the Savior, and taught to pray the Holy Spirit 
to fill it and cleanse its soul from all inbred sin; 
to so purify it that He might abide in its young 
life and develop it as He did the life of John 
the Baptist, and as He filled and developed the 
life of the Boy Jesus. This is what is due the chil- 
dren of Christian homes and communities. But, 
alas! so many parents are not Christians, and so 
many professors are strangers to this cleansing 
through faith, and the days of early opportunity are 
permitted to pass from them and their children. 
Thus youth grows up without the proper instruction 
and the sin life develops a crop of sad transgres- 
sions. What the child needs to insure it a right life 
the adult convert needs thoroughly, a "consecration 
for the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire." 

"But ye shall receive power after that the Holy 
Ghost is come upon you." (Acts 1:8.) Bead the 
words of Jesus in Luke 24 : 49. The Christian stands 
pardoned and justified before God as long as he is 
seeking and walking up to the light of the Spirit, 
which means exercise, growth, development. It is the 
mind of the Spirit to lead the young convert to and 
into Christian perfection. John Wesley says that 
"sanctification begins at conversion." It is true, for 
conversion is the first step and the foundation of all 
Christian development, and the agent that works 
the one change in the heart works the other; that is, 

29 



STEPS m THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

the "Third Person in the Holy Trinity, the Holy 
Spirit." 

Christ died on the cross nineteen hundred years 
ago for the sins of the whole world, and as the peni- 
tent looks away from all earthly means to that cross 
for salvation he needs some one to reveal to him that 
the work is done; then he who is God's ambassador 
administers the will of Christ, applies to the heart of 
the penitent the solace of the redeeming sacrifice on 
the cross. 

Now, when a person is brought to see that he is 
not free from the bondage of sin, and desires a clean 
heart, he wants to know how to approach the Throne 
of Grace. When he has learned the conditions and 
acted upon them, he wishes to know that the condi- 
tions have been properly satisfied. He is plainly 
taught this in the fact that forgiveness is received in 
answer to faith in Christ by the witness of the Holy 
Spirit, and that cleansing has been given in answer 
to faith in the living Fountain for sin ; and cleansing 
by the Holy Spirit, who is the only agent that can do 
the work, comes into the soul to purify and energize. 
He carries with His presence the fire to consume the 
carnal life and to give a more abundant life. 

But you say, Are there not many Christians who 
have lived good, holy lives and have not been in- 
structed in this manner ? We must answer, Yes. But 
where some have held out through the storms of life, 
many others have fallen by the way. We believe, 
however, that those who have fallen might have been 
saved had they but seen the light ; and we also believe 

30 



KEPENTANCE. 

that if those who were saved and succeeded without 
instruction had been led to a full consecration for 
cleansing, they would have escaped many a defeat, 
and been more thorough in the Christian life and 
work. 

John Wesley, who was raised up to spread Scrip- 
tural holiness, states that at one time, after examin- 
ing fifty-five Christians, and on another occasion six 
hundred, he was convinced by their straightforward 
testimonies that they had all received second blessings 
in answer to faith as a definite work of grace, and 
that some of them had received it as soon after con- 
version as one day, and others as soon as one-half 
day, closing with the words, "I wonder that all Chris- 
tians are not seeking for this blessing." 

GROWTH IN GRACE. 

Justification gives us a title to heaven ; sanctifica- 
tion prepares us for heaven; conversion brings us 
into the reception room of the Holy Spirit — into the 
Holy Place; the door of the guest chamber of the 
Holy Ghost is opened and we are ushered into that 
delightful abode through the door of full consecra- 
tion and faith. The partition that separates the 
Holy Place from the Holy of Holies was removed 
when Christ suffered on the cross, and the "veil was 
rent from top to bottom." All are invited to come 
with a sacrifice — not a bull, or a heifer, or a kid, or a 
lamb ; for "God has provided a sacrifice, the lamb that 
was slain from the foundation of the world." (Heb. 

31 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

10 : 10-14.) We must bring our lives a living sac- 
rifice, "holy, acceptable unto God." (Rom. 12: 1, 2.) 
Some will say, "I believe in growth in grace." 
Yes, dear reader, so do I, and so does the Holy Ghost. 
But there is a difference in growth in grace and a 
growing into grace. The justified life is a state en- 
tered into by faith; but we never grow into it, but 
are brought into it by the touch of the Holy Spirit 
through faith. Every Christian begins to grow from 
that time if any degree of Christian character is 
developed, and continues growing toward the perfec- 
tion, whether conscious or unconscious of the fact. 
Though not instructed as to the different steps to be 
taken, if the going Christian continues to walk in 
the light, he comes nearer and nearer the point of 
full surrender of all his powers to the service of his 
Lord and Master. Nearly all the Epistles to the 
different Churches point to this step of full surrender, 
and Jesus calls attention to the importance of the 
enduement of power, as in Luke 24 : 49 ; and in Acts 
1:8; showing that Christian perfection, or holiness 
of life, is a state to be obtained by a special work of 
grace through the Holy Ghost. When this is accom- 
plished we are brought knowingly under His direct 
influence and control, so that our soul, mind, and 
body will be under His leadership. But you may ask, 
"Can't we make mistakes in this new life and new 
relation ?" Yes, most assuredly. We may make mis- 
takes of the mind, but not of the heart, as we are 
made perfect in love, but not in mind. We are to 
learn this important lesson, that we are to grow as 

32 



KEPENTANCE. 

never before, as the disabilities of the soul have been 
removed, and we are in the larger sense a "temple 
of the Holy Ghost." That assures us the Holy Ghost 
has come into his temple to stay, to take up His abode 
there. He does need such a place for a permanent 
abode. He is there when necessary to lead, develop, 
and train our lives according to His will, We are to 
learn that when we make a mistake or come short in 
some Christian act or duty, notwithstanding the de- 
flection, we and our Lord are the best of friends, and 
His Spirit is with us to help us. While He is to be 
obeyed, He is not a tyrant, but a kind, tender, loving, 
dear Friend. As the most interested Teacher, and so 
patient, in my early experience He taught me this im- 
portant lesson, that when there is a doubt in my mind 
as to the proper time for an act to be done, to give 
myself the benefit of the doubt; and, why? For the 
reason that if there is any ground for Satan to come 
in with his temptations, he is sure to do so; but if 
then I could say, the Lord and I are bosom friends, 
and I should do everything in good faith to the best 
of my knowledge, all would be right. If I lacked 
light He would provide it when needed. 

In the holy state we are to be led into such paths 
of Christian work as He sees necessary to train us in 
that respect. For instance, I was led by the Spirit 
to go out and read the Scriptures and pray in the 
homes of my neighbors ; one of the first was my own 
father's home in the far West. We were then living 
in Southern California, in our own house; father 
and family had moved here from Southern Illinois 
8 33 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

in the year 1876, and mother had passed to her 
heavenly home soon after our arrival. Father, in 
poor health, sad and lonely, had neglected to unite 
with the Church. It was not long after my deter- 
mination to read the Word and pray in his home that, 
one Sunday morning while preparing for Church, I 
was impressed with the thought that something un- 
usual would occur that day. To the surprise of many, 
when, at the close of the sermon the call was made 
for persons to join the Church, father walked for- 
ward and gave the minister his hand. At the close 
of the service there was a scene that angels were de- 
lighted to behold, when by the influence of the Holy 
Spirit a father and son wept on each other's bosom 
for joy in that restoration to spiritual life. 

One more example of how the Spirit leads those 
who are fully given up to Him. A neighbor of ours 
had been attending holiness meetings at different 
times as she had opportunity. She was the mother of 
a large family, a member of the Presbyterian Church, 
and an earnest seeker for the best way for herself 
and family. She finally made a full surrender and 
recognized the witness of the Spirit. Some time after 
this she was in a convention of Chrisiari Workers, 
and during the hours of worship she arose and stated 
that she felt moved to lead in prayer, and did so — a 
thing she would not have dared to do before the bap- 
tism of the Spirit, but being filled and urged by the 
Holy Ghost she was without fear. 

I will give another case. A brother Christian, 
a man of great force of character, a leader in Sabbath 

34 



EEPENTANCE. 

school work, some of us saw, was not perfectly ad- 
vanced in Christian development. He finally came to 
see it himself, gave up his negligent way of life, and 
sought for the cleansing and filling of the Spirit. 
He testified that he had been fighting that doctrine 
for forty-one years; but now he was so full that he 
was overflowing as an artesian well. So full is the 
grace given us when all the shackles of the soul life 
have been removed and when growth has freedom in 
the light and inspiration of the Spirit. 

HOLINESS IMPERATIVE. 

Is holiness optional with the candidate ? Yes ; he 
has the power to refuse or accept the heaven-bought 
privilege; but he can not walk up to the light and 
hold back after he is convinced of his need and his 
duty, without blocking the divine will ; for the Word* 
says, "Be ye holy ; for I am holy," and "without holi- 
ness no one shall see the Lord." It is not optional, 
but imperative if the seeker would obtain what is 
sought. It is a command that is repeated over and 
over. The Scriptures speak of holiness by the use of 
different terms that point to the same state six hun- 
dred times. I fear that many fail to grasp the mean- 
ing, and tarry in expectation of the enduement, and, 
wandering in the mists of uncertainty and doubts, 
coldness comes into the heart. But "this is the will 
of God, even our sanctification." The Spirit aims 
to place the subject in a position where He may de- 
velop and "bring forth much fruit." (John 15: 5.) 

35 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

WHAT SANCTIFICATION DOES. 

What does sanctification do for the person as to 
the sin of his life between him and his God ? It clears 
the record back to the time when he was first born, 
even to his earliest breath; whereas conversion and 
regeneration clear the record back to the time of the 
first actual transgression. Cleansing clears away the 
roots of sin that were in the soul when it was born. It 
also subdues the will, and the subject discovers that 
to know his own will he must find God's will; then 
he knows his own will, for he is to be "led by the 
Spirit of the Lord/' (Eom. 8:14.) "Ye are no 
more servants to sin, but servants to righteousness." 
(Eom. 6 : 17.) Ye are to reckon your bodies as "dead 
indeed to sin, but alive to righteousness." We hold 
that it is better intelligently to understand our soul 
nature and the nature of the remedy that will en- 
able us to advance step by step toward the state of 
grace that gives us a reasonable hope of successful 
living and fighting the battles of life; for there are 
enemies to fight, but if we are sure of our ground 
and understand the dextrous use of our weapons and 
are in position to understand the character of the 
enemy of our souls, we will feel a sense of security 
as Christ is to help us fight our battles. He has said. 
"In the world ye shall have persecution, but in Me 
ye shall have peace;" and again, "Be not dismayed. 
He that is in you is greater than he that is in the 
world," that is Satan. 



36 



KEPENTANCE. 
WILL WE HAVE TEMPTATION? 

Why should we not have temptation ? Christ, our 
Savior, who never committed a sin, was sorely 
tempted of Satan, but was victorious because he de- 
tected the wiles of the enemy, and knew what weapon 
to use, the sword of the Spirit, the Word. So the 
Lord may permit us to be tempted as a means of test- 
ing us, giving us this experience that we may under- 
stand Satan's power and his mode of work. 

There have been times when Satan has awakened 
me in the silent hours of the night ready to drive a 
dagger to my soul — the weapon of doubt. But, 
thanks be unto God's name, when I detected the 
presence of the cloven-footed monster, I was able 
to send a pebble of God's Word from the sling of 
faith against him and put him to flight. I was 
strengthened by the words of the Master, "I will never 
leave thee nor forsake thee, I will be with thee to the 
end of the world." I can truly thank the Lord for 
such temptations as came from Satan, for without 
them I could never have found the knowledge of his 
sly manner of working. Paul said on one occasion, 
"I will come to visions and revelations." If the 
writer hereof has ever come to the same in some de- 
gree, it is because the Lord has been pleased to bring 
them to me. For example, one evening while engaged 
in private prayer the curtain was drawn aside for a 
space of time, and I saw two Satanic angels struggling 
to get at me, but I fervently prayed and was delivered 
from their power. 

37 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN" LIFE. 

During one of my revival meetings in Ohio in the 
year 1904, a young lady who had received the blessing 
of cleansing was sorely tempted during one whole 
day in this way: Something kept saying to her, "I 
would not go to Church to-night/' "You ought not 
go to Church." Occasionally she could hear another 
voice saying, "Go to Church to-night." This confused 
her, and she came to the conclusion if no one invited 
her to go, she would stay away. Both voices were in- 
terested in her decision — the one to benefit, the other 
to hinder. Before the hour for Church assembling a 
school classmate passed by and invited her to accom- 
pany her to the meeting. She accepted, and after 
Church, with her friend, called into the parsonage to 
ask my opinion as to the meaning of the contending 
voices. When I gave my views she said, "I am con- 
vinced that the prominent, forbidding voice was Sa- 
tan's, and the gentle, persuasive voice was that of the 
Lord's Spirit." Yes, Satan was trying with all his 
power to swing her from the line of right, to so con- 
fuse her as to lead her mind to doubt her duty and 
bear her into spiritual darkness. The young passing 
friend, her schoolmate, had obtained the experience of 
cleansing a few evenings before, but when her class- 
mate gave her testimony she regarded it as so much 
better than her own recent experience that she was 
inclined to refrain from telling what the Lord had 
done for her. She felt condemned by the Spirit. I 
told her to at once confess to the Lord her wrong, 
and we all knelt down and prayed, and she was re- 
stored into God's favor at once. The other girl had 

38 



EEPENTANCE. 

peace and satisfaction in learning the nature of the 
voices that had been speaking to her all day. 

Dear reader, as I told these girls that they had 
acted wisely in seeking good, safe counsel for help 
and relief, so would I advise every young Christian 
when stirred by the spirit of doubt. If assailed by 
condemnation, at once confess to the Lord and ask 
forgiveness and restoration to His favor, according to 
His wise will. He knows we are weak and inex- 
perienced and need His help, and will give it. 

Every young Christian should feel free to seek 
the counsel of older Christians, and especially ask of 
those who are spiritually-minded, as there are chances 
that some Christian in consultation might not be 
spiritually competent to give the counsel that is 
needed. We should remember that, though Satan is 
cast out of the heart at sanctification, he will do his 
utmost to lead astray and occasion the loss of our 
bright experience. He is going about, not always as 
a roaring lion, but moves often as an angel of light, 
with special determination to deceive and discourage 
the young Christian in either experience of justifica- 
tion or sanctification. And there is a cause for this, 
for he does not want the beginner to escape from his 
grasp while in the justified state, while there are yet 
some roots of sin remaining in the heart which he 
may be able to further cultivate in some impulse of 
the inner nature. 

In the state of complete sanctification the old man 
has been thoroughly evicted with all his possessions. 
If the enemy would invade this territory he must 

39 



STEPS m THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

advance through the mind, with the suggestion of 
some thought as to what the beginner should do, or 
leave undone in the line of duty, or with some insinu- 
ation as to his state as a Christian, or with a thought 
to discourage him in his Christian life and work. 

Dear reader, bear in mind that you will never 
know at what point in your life he will attack you. 
Eemember he has been cast out of your soul and 
Christ has taken full posession by His Spirit. "So 
count yourself dead indeed to sin/' in the singular 
number, but alive unto God, to be filled, trained, and 
led by Him. In a prayerful, obedient, trustful life 
we are assured of His protection and care. As He 
says, "Be not dismayed, for He that is within you is 
greater than he that is without." 

WHAT IS BAPTISM? 

Christ commanded His apostles to go and preach 
the gospel that all men everywhere should repent. 
(Mark 16 : 15, 16.) He said unto them, "Go ye into 
all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. 
He that belie veth and is baptized shall be saved, but 
he that believeth not shall be damned." He that 
believeth continues to trust God and work right- 
eousness. That righteousness must begin within, and 
work out from within, for our acts are the fruits of 
the inner life whether of sin or salvation. 

Thus baptism is a command, and our Lord, 
though He had no sin to wash away, assumed the 
place of the sinner, and did the thing the sinner was 

40 



REPENTANCE. 

commanded to do. He told John to suffer it to be 
so in order to fulfill all righteousness, that he might 
be a true pattern, and to show that it is imperative 
on the part of the subject under the law of God; for 
He has made known what is to be done in obedience 
to Him and to obtain His favor. 

"Repent, believe, and be baptized." Here bap- 
tism is shown as a door of admission into the Church. 
It ushers the candidate into the privileges of the 
Kingdom ; for baptism was the first public step taken 
by Christ before entering upon His work as a Priest 
and Teacher; it was a fulfilling of the law, giving 
Him a public right to enter upon His peculiar office. 
Baptism is a sign given to mankind that the subject 
renounces the world to live under the covenant and 
requirements of the Church. It is also a seal which 
the Church places upon its subjects when taking them 
into its fellowship ; it is typical, besides, of cleansing, 
and an outward sign of that which is regarded as 
having taken place in the soul through the working 
of the Holy Spirit in answer to the faith of the can- 
didate. I have no quarrel with the immersionist, but 
believe in a form of baptism that will reach every case. 
Hence I have something to say in behalf of the weak 
and innocent, the infant. If we are to wait until each 
candidate becomes old enough to make a choice, I 
fear we may be taking a great risk if it is proper to 
say that all are entitled to the right of baptism. We 
are informed that half the mortality in the human 
family takes place during infancy. If this be true, 
it seems to myself and others of the same belief that 

41 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

we are coming short somewhere if there is no pro- 
vision whereby this class of human beings may be 
brought into a true relation to the Church. Jesus 
said, "Suffer little children to come unto Me, and 
forbid them not." Why, Lord, why can they not 
wait until they are old enough to understand the 
truths as taught by the Word ? But Jesus says, "They 
are already subjects of the Kingdom of heaven;" and 
if they are already subjects of the Kingdom by virtue 
of the atonement, and Christ pronounces them so, 
who art thou, man ! to forbid their fellowship in 
that communion? And why should not the parent 
stand sponsor for the child ? As in the case of Sam- 
uel's mother, "She vowed to give or loan the child 
to the Lord all his days if the Lord would hear her 
prayer and give her a son." The prayer was an- 
swered, and as soon as the son was weaned and was 
old enough to leave his mother, she took him to the 
temple to wait upon and to do every possible service 
for the old priest Eli. Thus parents acted for their 
children in matters of religion in the Old Testament 
times. On the eighth day after the birth they were 
circumcised as a sign of their separation from the 
world and as a seal of God's recognition of His chosen 
people. This rite was administered at different ages, 
from the eighth day after the birth of the male child 
as a fixed date by law. If for some cause it could 
not be performed at that time, it might be deferred to 
a later time in life. So we believe in a rite of baptism 
that is sufficiently elastic in its character to meet the 
requirement of all classes. If not, there is a favored 

42 



KEPENTANCE. 

order or rank in the Church. The innocent are per- 
mitted to die without the administration of the rite 
because of their extreme youth ; they are deprived of 
what is theirs by the standard of truth and justice by 
virtue of the atonement, and are not saved. But we 
are here admonished by the Savior's words to repel 
such a doctrine, "Except ye become as little children 
ye can not enter the Kingdom of God." The parent 
stands sponsor for the child in matters of clothing, 
food, education, and association; and if so in these 
necessities, why should not the parent be responsible 
for the child's spiritual training and development? 
Why should not the parent bring the child into the 
Church, and by prayer and consecration and baptism 
place it as near to the Savior as can be done on this 
earth? Then solemnly vow to live before it a holy 
life, and- teach it that it has been dedicated to the 
Lord and the Church, and bring it up as a lamb in the 
fold, rather than let it grow up among the wolves. 

Dear reader, if you are a parent take this warning 
now ; consecrate your life to the Lord, and solicit the 
enduement of the Spirit to help your children from 
wandering in the way of sin; and if you are not a 
parent, so live in the sight of men that your influence 
will help to make lighter the burden of Christian 
parents, and touch the heart of some wayward boy or 
girl. 



43 




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44 



Part II. 
FIRST ROAD— SIN, SINNING. 

The diagram on the opposite page is for the pur- 
pose of riveting on the mind the different steps as 
well as the different roads representing the different 
lives. N". B. — represents the natural birth of the 
person in this natural life; the time when we begin 
to live and to grow toward a state of consciousness. 
At a very early date the child begins to take notice 
of those who have it under their care, and to imitate 
them by doing and acting as do those who are its 
guides. Thus early in life is the time to set right 
examples before the child, that as it copies after its 
elders it may form good habits, which are as easy 
to form as those that are bad or careless. As it is 
solely dependent upon those under whose care it is 
placed, you will see why, as I have before said in this 
book, it should be placed under intelligent religious 
parentage, as it is "entitled to a Christian birthright." 
To show how entirely helpless and dependent a child 
is on the parent, we may compare its condition with 
that of the lower order of animals. No other animal 
is so helpless as the infant. It can not walk, it can 
not talk, it can not sit upright, it has no means of 
helping itself to its needs of sustaining life only as 

45 



STEPS IN" THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

it is helped by the intelligence of the parent. The 
knowledge needed and the opportunity required in 
molding its young life and training it in pure and 
holy habits must come from the parent. As to its 
language, if a child of English parentage should be 
trained among Germans it will adopt their language, 
and no other, if it hears no other while growing up. 
Such is the case with any child, no matter what its 
nationality. Furthermore, if it were possible that 
a child should grow up to hear no language or 
sounds but the howls and screams of wild beasts of 
the forest, such would become the practice of the 
child. Showing that we are born without any lan- 
guage, but are taught by circumstances and environ- 
ment. 

This being true, how important it is that those 
having the rearing of the child should train it in 
pure, good habits and words ! A child will not utter 
a word that it has not heard from other lips, nor 
coin a language to describe to others what it has wit- 
nessed of good or evil. In the early stages of the 
child life an image is drawn on the mind as to the 
behavior of a person, and later in time as to the lan- 
guage used. How important, then, that our acts and 
words should be of such a nature that, when copied, 
they will not be misleading, but will lay foundations 
in the young mind so durable that a Christian char- 
acter shall be built upon them of which parents and 
child will not be ashamed in future years. Think how 
often shame comes upon the lives of those who grow 
up in the way of using careless and impure language. 

46 



FIKST EOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

I had a beautiful, lovely little nephew who used to 
stay with us in our home. One day my wife's atten- 
tion was called to Hallie — that was his name — who 
was standing by a chair, turning over the leaves of a 
book. He would be silent a moment or two as if in 
prayer. Wife said, "Hallie, what are you doing?" 
He turned to her and said, "That is the way Uncle 
Basil does." He was imitating his uncle's actions in 
family worship. We want children to grow with 
righteous lives. We must have enough interest in 
them to be Christians ourselves, and to live righteous 
lives in word and deed. 

I recently read of a mother who was so fatigued 
with nursing and caring for her sick babe that when 
an opportunity offered during her child's moment of 
sleeping she went down stairs to take a little rest. 
As she went down one day she heard another child, 
a little maid of four summers, in an adjoining room, 
talking as if in conversation. She slipped to the 
door, which was partly open, and saw that her child 
had pulled a chair up to the telephone, and was kneel- 
ing on the chair with the receiver held to the side of 
her face, and carrying on a conversation as though 
speaking through the phone repeating the answer. 
She said, "Hello, who is there? Is God there?" 
"Yes." "Is Jesus there?" "Yes." "I want to 
speak to Him. Well, is that You, Jesus?" "Yes; 
what is it ?" "Well, our baby is sick and we want You 
to let it get well ; won't You, now ?" No answer came 
and the request was repeated, and finally answered 
by a "Yes." Then the little girl replaced the re- 

47 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

ceiver on its hook, and climbed down to run to her 
listening mother with a beaming countenance, and 
was caught up in that mother's arms. The babe that 
had been hopelessly given up began to recover from 

that day. 

for the simplicity of a child's faith ! It is God's 
ideal of faith, simple, trusting confidence ! If more 
of us were possessed of it, how different would be the 
condition of this old world of sadness and unbelief ! 
If more children were thus taught by example, which 
is an easy lesson if the parents have the Christ spirit, 
what a heaven upon earth ! But the little ones are 
neglected, and instead of leading the right life they 
are surrounded with influences that are more favor- 
able to sin. But even admitting this, there comes a 
time when the being, either as youth or adult, must 
be assisted by the Holy Spirit, and be made to see the 
sinfulness of his condition. Then he pines for pardon 
and regeneration ; and that period of time, whether 
long or short, between the natural birth or the second 
or spiritual birth, brings him on this road to the S. B., 
second birth or spiritual birth; this period, the sec- 
ond birth, is called the new birth or justification, a 
just life, or walking in the new way as the light of 
God reveals it. 

This period of Christian living may be longer or 
shorter, according to the instruction given. If the 
instruction is properly given, the seeker may be led 
into the light of cleansing ; but if lacking in proper 
instruction as to his privileges in the different steps 
or states of grace, the soul will often feel the need of 

48 



FIKST KOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

a greater induement of power, or lament its disa- 
bility to do the things that the judgment recommends 
as right. It fails to understand its privilege of 
making a full and complete consecration of the whole 
being — body, soul, mind, time, talent, knowledge or 
ignorance of things — to be wholly the Lord's; to re- 
ceive the cleansing and filling of the soul with the 
Pentecost, which is the seeker's right as heir of God, 
made so at consecration, but brought into fuller rela- 
tion and privilege under the second work of grace, 
which takes place at the third station of the road 
on the diagram, where you see the rod of consecra- 
tion. 

Christ passed under the rod of consecration and 
crucified His own will that He might take the place 
of the sinner. Our attention is called to His pure life 
in the place of the sinner at His baptism in the Jor- 
dan ; and the Father was well pleased with Him and 
His act when He said to John, "Suffer it to be so now, 
to fulfill all righteousness." Hence the voice from 
heaven saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I 
am well pleased," and the visible presence of the 
dove, signifying the baptism of the Holy Ghost; 
showing that the Father knew His Son would need all 
the strength, light, and help He could give Him for 
the trying ordeal He was to pass through as He 
entered the mountain of fasting and temptation. If 
Christ needed the Spirit's special power and light 
and strength to enable Him to overthrow the enemy 
of His creatures, Himself, and the Kingdom He was 
to set upon earth, should not we as His ambassadors 

4 49 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

and soldiers (for we will have to fight the fight of 
faith) need the same induement of power? We 
must bring our self-will into subjection, and pass 
under the rod in full consecration unto God, with 
faith to believe that He is able and willing to allow 
our sacrifice "which is holy, acceptable to Him/' 
(Eom. 12: 1, 2,) and wait for the baptism and wit- 
ness of the Spirit which He has promised. Jesus 
says, "I sanctify Myself, that they might be sancti- 
fied through the truth; the Word is truth." (John 
17:1M9.) 

You will now find the letters C. 0. N. on the 
diagram, which stand for consecration, and P. U. K., 
which means to pass from under your own will power 
into God's will power; that you may desire to do 
His will to the best of your ability, assisted by His 
grace; for "He is able to make all grace to abound 
in you" (1 Thess. 5: 23, 24), and His favor to rest 
with and in you, by His Spirit, which is to dwell in 
you, to keep and fit the temple, which is your body, 
that you may see the letters P. 1ST. T., at the rod on 
the diagram, which denotes your Pentecost. (Acts 
2:1,2.) 

Some will say the work is all accomplished at 
conversion ; some will halt and hesitate and insist that 
no one can live without sin in this world of sin ; and 
some will say, "If the work of conversion has been 
executed in our lives, what more have we to do?" 
Such an argument as the last denotes that their 
highest thought is to merely be successful in looking 
after their own little barque on the tumultuous sea 

50 



FIRST EOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

of life. They should earnestly realize that the virtue 
of the atonement is so full and complete, so able to 
save to the uttermost, that it must relieve them from 
a selfish contemplation of their own little affairs, and 
direct their thoughts to the wretched condition of 
others whose boats on the great sea are poor and 
leaky, and water-soaked and on the verge of sinking. 
Dear reader, without answering any further ob- 
jections that may arise in the mind of the doubter, 
let me advise you to read God's Word carefully ; take 
a reference Bible and search the passages that refer to 
this topic ; then read the story of the lives and deaths 
of the sanctified, and compare them with the lives 
and work of those who are doubters of the doctrine. 
We may refer you to Wesley, John Fletcher, Bishop 
Taylor, Watson, McDonald, Wood, Smith, Euth, and 
many other citizens in the commonwealth of Christ 
by the thousands. The writer himself can testify to 
a life of nearly thirty years in this most blessed, holy 
fellowship with the Triune God. 

THE ASSOCIATIONS ON THIS 
ROAD OF LIFE. 

The children of nature are at home in each other's 
company ; having similar interests, they are congenial 
and each seek a likeness to himself in thought and 
ways of activity. Association forms a large factor 
in molding their lives. What is true with the chil- 
dren of nature, is true with the children of grace. 
When a person is born again from above he enters 

51 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

a new realm; he awakes to new interests, and be- 
gins to possess the desire of new associates; he feels 
that other demands are made upon his life; that the 
old associates and the food that seems to give them 
nourishment no longer satisfies his spirit; and he 
joins with those of a higher life in a mutual commu- 
nity of interest because the same spirit is exercising 
their lives. 

The child of nature does not comprehend this 
spiritual life; it is a sphere above him; he has no 
knowledge of it, as it is spiritually discerned; he 
beholds it only through the ignorance of inexperi- 
ence. The justified Christian, knowing the condition 
of the child of nature or sinner, can sympathize with 
him and pray for him; can tell him what a dear 
Savior has been found, and urge him to leave the 
paths of sin and darkness and accept the life of peace 
and happiness and light. The converted man, look- 
ing back on the past, realizes the sinfulness of sin 
as never before, and knows what a pleasure it is to 
be at peace with God and man and his neighbor, 
and with all nature— such as he could never before 
have conceived. 

In the sanctified life there is a familiarity of 
spiritual interest and experience, which is a step 
higher than the justified state. This child of exalted 
grace can sympathize with and pity the poor blind 
child of nature, the servant of sin and Satan, as never 
before when he realizes from what a high heirship his 
sins are shutting him out. The Christian in this 
glorious advanced station can tell the justified child 

52 



PIEST KOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

how much better it is to be free from the stirring 
of sin within, than to be ever stirring to keep under 
subjection the sin nature that positively refuses to 
be subdued; but in an unguarded moment, when 
least expected, exerts its power and puts the pro- 
fessor to shame. This child of liberty in the gospel 
earnestly presses the young convert to take the step 
that will carry him higher into the liberty from bond- 
age and to the fullness of the blessing of the gospel 
of the Holy Ghost. 

Two persons of like experience in spirit, though 
strangers in the flesh in conversing together, will 
soon detect their similarity in spiritual experience, 
and their hearts will be strangely warmed as they 
talk of their hopes and pleasures in the liberty of the 
Holy Spirit. 

If we are traveling on a highway in this every- 
day world, our experience will depend on the condi- 
tion of the road over which we are traveling. If the 
Way is hilly, we will be compelled to travel up or 
down, as the surface varies. If the road is down 
grade, we will be forced to descend; if up grade, we 
must ascend. Here is simply represented the life of 
sin and the life of righteousness. The tendency of 
a life of sin is downward; it is going farther from 
righteousness, from God's light and favor, and the 
result is to separate one's self farther and farther 
from those who are living on the highlands of faith. 

"What fellowship hath light with darkness?" 
The two are naturally separate. Sin and righteous- 
ness can not move together any more than light and 

53 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN" LIFE. 

darkness. A space has entered between the lives of 
saint and sinner, and that space becomes greater as 
time passes; and each one moves upon roads that 
gradually diverge, and a greater distance is made 
possible between the two persons in their spiritual 
lives. Often these very persons are of like interests 
in other ways of life; they are even joined together 
by the laws of God and the land in affection and love 
and holy matrimony. They have in a solemn cere- 
mony pledged faith, "each to the other until death 
do them part;" and yet are living in two different 
realms, because of the different condition of their 
souls. So long as this continues the Christian must 
be burdened for the sake of the companion who is a 
sinner. How can it be otherwise while the Christian 
lives a good, healthful life, and the other continues 
in sinfulness ? The Christian constantly realizes what 
a glorious privilege it is to live in peace and fellow- 
ship with the Savior, and how much the sinner com- 
panion is missing and to what constant danger of 
losing the soul, that companion is exposed in re- 
maining away from the fold of the Great Shepherd. 
You behold the issue. You follow the road traveled 
by the sinner, and the end thereof is bound to be 
Eternal Death — a separation of two lives forever. 
The letters which denote this sad end on the diagram, 
are E. T. D., Eternal Death. Dear reader, may I not 
urge you to be sure of the road you are traveling 
toward eternity? Your eternal destiny will depend 
on your course in the last hour, when death shall 
find you. 

54 



FIEST EOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

Let us be reasonable and seasonable in our in- 
quiries as to the value in character of these three 
roads. They symbolize the real highway of life in 
the natural world from the cradle to the grave. 

If you, dear reader, expect to make a long journey 
to some distant country, let us say from anywhere 
in the East to the sunny South — Southern California, 
for instance — you will make inquiries in reference 
to the best route, and the expense and the point of 
destination and the most favorable time of year to 
enjoy your trip and witness the perfection in beauty 
and attractiveness and flowers and fruits of that 
prolific climate. If we take so much thought and 
pains to plan a successful journey in this old world 
of ours, which is the homeland to enjoy but for 
a brief stay, how much more important it is to be 
interested in our journey through this life, and to 
seek information regarding the road to be traveled in 
reaching our destination, and the character of the 
country at the end; whether we shall find a land of 
blooming flowers and golden fruits and singing birds, 
or a barren waste where all is deathlike and desolate ; 
whether we shall meet congenial companions and 
loved ones of the past waiting to welcome us in a 
perpetual sunlit clime ; or whether, on the other hand, 
we shall experience sadness and remorse of soul in 
finding that the end of our journey indicates not 
only the agonized parting with loved ones forever, but 
that we are cast out from all that is lovely and pleas- 
ing, and are swept into a strange and unknown realm 
without the prospect of a kind friend to greet us. 

55 



STEPS IN" THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

The end of this road is eternal death, marked in 
the diagram, as we have said, by the letters E. T. D. 
Here Satan is permitted to have his own, as God 
deals justly with all of His creatures, even with 
Satan; for if we will serve him and sin here upon 
earth, and do not choose to make use of the remedy 
for sin and break the power of Satan's rule in our 
lives, and we live for him and die in his service, our 
Heavenly Father can not do otherwise than permit 
Satan to have his own. Our Lord and Savior has no 
power over our souls if we have invited Satan to rule 
therein. The Lord will not inhabit the life in which 
Satan has right of way by choice of the subject. 
Hence God has no inclination to save from the power 
of sin and Satan without the consent of the one con- 
cerned. "As the tree falleth, so it must lie." 

THE SECOND ROAD— VARIABLE. 

The Second Eoad on the diagram represents that 
on which the sinner enters when he repents and turns 
from his sins, and believes on "Jesus Christ for re- 
mission of all his sins, and is resurrected from the 
death of sin to the life of righteousness." Hence it 
is called the Eoad of Justification, and so long as 
the seeker pursues it in true faith and obedience to 
all known deeds of right living, he will ascend to 
higher reaches of spiritual knowlege and comfort to 
the end. 

But the character of this road is a gradual and 
wearisome ascent, and the traveler, through occasional 

56 



FIKST KOAD— SIN", SINNING. 

fatigue, may feel like receding, provided lie does not 
receive the "light of the gospel of our Lord and 
Savior Jesus Christ" for the "baptism of the Pente- 
cost" for those who look for the "promise of the 
Father ;" as Jesus says in Luke 24 : 29, "Behold, I 
send the promise of My Father upon you; tarry ye 
in the city of Jerusalem until ye be endued with 
power from on high." 

Among those who do not claim nor look for the 
Pentecost till some indefinite time, if at all before 
death, there are multitudes of Christians. There are 
many living in the "converting stage, that is, sin and 
repent, sin and repent;" as Euth says, "The bedside 
of many a professor is a mourner's bench, a place for 
confessing shortcomings and darling sins." This 
road in the diagram represents the way traveled by 
the hesitants and indolent. They that do not fall 
away through discouragement, but by prayer and 
faith and preservance hold out, though with some 
seeds of carnality still remaining within the soul, 
will reach the goal, and Death will weed out the 
root of sin, cleansing all at the parting of this life. 

The Word plainly teaches that "without holiness 
no man shall see the Lord," and "Blessed are the 
pure in heart, for they shall see God." The human 
life must be in harmony with the Holy Spirit; His 
influence must rule in the hearts of His children 
as He rules in heaven, that when the hour of death 
comes there will be no need of preparing for the 
change. 

The will of the Father through life is your sanc- 
57 



STEPS m THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

tification, that you may be well acquainted with 
the Holy Ghost as an abiding Guest, Teacher, and 
Trainer. According to the words of Christ in John, 
referring to the Father, "He will take of the things 
of Mine, and give them to you." He takes the 
place of Christ, and in order that He may be the 
more successful in training and developing our soul 
powers it is necessary for Him to come into our 
bodies, "which are His temple," to abide and shed 
His light therein after our cleansing. "God is light, 
and in Him is no darkness at all." If God, the Holy 
Ghost, is thus "dwelling in His temple, which temple 
ye are," how can darkness be there ? It can not be if 
He dwells there in His fullness. 

It becomes the will of the Keeper of this temple to 
furnish and garnish it according to His own liking; 
as He is to be the dweller therein He leads the sub- 
ject to surrender his rule to Him; and when this is 
accomplished He begins a reform in the life of the 
individual which involves his character and his whole 
being, approving such acts and thoughts as are con- 
ducive to Christian development, by giving him a 
sense of happiness and joy when he is led to perform 
some new Christian deed, and a sense of disapproval 
by bringing a check on the conscience or sorrow to 
the heart when anything occurs to the subject that 
is not of a nature to build up the Christian character. 

If for any reason the seeker has not attained 
the place in the approval of the Holy Spirit that 
we have named as right, his purification from the 
tarnish of the world must be accomplished at some 

58 



FIEST KOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

time before passing over the river of death — for 
there is no purifying power or quality in death it- 
self — if the soul would be prepared to meet its judg- 
ment. There must in this case be a double death — 
the death of self-will, which is the carnal principle, 
as well as the death of the body. You will see at 
the end of this highway the two letters, T. D., signi- 
fying Two Deaths. 

If I could lead the readers of this book to witness 
a few of the sad scenes that are presented before the 
Holy Spirit at the deathbed of many a professor 
who has lived short of his privileges, with only just 
enough grace in his life to show that he may be con- 
sidered a Christian, instead of pressing earnestly to 
the Throne of Grace — if the lukewarm could stand 
in spirit before such a deathbed, what a warning to 
change his life would be there ! Would that all could 
see what a risk they run, on the one hand, of being 
overcome by Satan's devices, who operates his own 
machinery, which is the carnal mind, in the way of 
deceiving by discouraging suggestions and working 
upon the unregenerate nature, thus weakening the 
spiritual life and causing the person to become dis- 
couraged and to give up trying as is too often the 
case; and would that all could see, on the other 
hand, what a blessed privilege to live with all their 
powers fully surrendered unto the Holy Ghost, that 
He might graciously purify and cleanse the sinfulness 
dwelling in their hearts! He is ever ready to thus 
establish our way in this life, if we will but come 
forward and ask Him with all His ability to infuse 

59 



STEPS m THE CHEISTIAN LIFE. 

the power of His influence as the mainspring of our 
lives. He is "like a refiner's fire and like fuller's 
soap; and He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of 
silver." (Mai. 3:2, 3.) 

for a safe Guide, One who has gone before and 
is qualified to lead us safely through the path which 
He has safely gone over and can show what is before 
us ! And what a solace to have the inward, abiding 
Comforter to strengthen the fibers of the soul! So 
that we may be able to stand when the test comes, and 
keep sweet the spirit in the hour of provocation! 
How blessed it is, when we are all alone, to know 
that He is cleansing us with a heavenly, hallowed 
breeze from the refreshing presence of His love ! 

THIRD ROAD— "HIGHWAY OF 
HOLINESS." 

Isa. 35: 8-10; Luke 7: 74, 75; 1 Thess. 3: 13; 
IThess. 5: 23,24. 

Dear reader, you will see that the Christian has 
traveled some distance on his Christian journey when 
he comes to this rod in the diagram. A passage under 
this rod represents the justified person when he is 
convinced of the sin life within. Here the sin root 
must be removed, instead of being "kept under," as 
some suggest. Keeping it under has not proved the 
best plan; nor is it God's plan; for why should He 
wish to have any of the seed sowed by Satan left 
in the soul ? No ; that is foreign to His plan, 

60 



FIEST EOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

which is thoroughly to remove the innate principle 
which has urged us to commit the first and all of 
the long catalogue of sins that have corrupted our 
lives. 

Self-will is the hardest thing in this world to 
overcome, and must be humbled and cast out. The 
good Lord noted this when He gave so many Scrip- 
tural promises to those who would obey this demand. 
At this rod self must be conquered; the Lord makes 
us aware from His high Word that neither you, nor 
I, nor any other person can do this of ourselves; 
but we can come forward with self, and lay it, 
with all that belongs to the self life, on the Chris- 
tian's altar, which is Christ, who, as the Word says, 
"has forever perfected them who are sanctified" by 
a perfect, complete, and all-sufficient sacrifice; by 
"dying to sin once, and so condemning sin in the 
flesh." Now, raised from the dead, "He liveth to 
God; sin hath no more dominion over Him;" He 
has thereby killed sin in the lives of His people, 
that they might be servants to sin no longer, through 
the virtue of the atonement. 

If there is no power to cleanse, and keep cleansed, 
the innate carnal principle of sin, then the plan of 
the atonement has in a measure failed. But until 
we prove it has failed we are without excuse in not 
recognizing its authority. When we go, with the 
sense of our need of crucifying the old man, and a 
full consecration of self-will, self-interest, of body, 
soul, and mind, what we are and what we expect 
to be under God, and believe that this is according 

61 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

to "God's will" (see Eom. 12:1, 2), and when all 
is on the altar, leave it there until the Spirit de- 
scends with His own power of cleansing and purify- 
ing fire, in answer to our faith in the Blood; when 
we go, thus believing, it is then the Holy Ghost takes 
the things of Christ and makes them real to us by 
applying them to the soul and bearing witness with 
our spirits that God does accept and perform the 
needed work in the soul. With this second work 
of grace comes a liberation from the inward bondage 
of sin never experienced before, and a power to act 
profitably in Christian work. There is familiar fel- 
lowship with those of like spirit which is perfectly 
natural. As the sinner likes his kind because the 
same spirit works in each, so does the justified Chris- 
tian find his sympathizing companions, and comfort 
in their association. All are thus endowed. Those 
enjoying the blessing of sanctification have like pleas- 
ure in fellowship with their kind, and can enter into 
each others society with hearts of unbounded sym- 
pathy. Wesley says that "sanctification began at con- 
version, and was completed at the second work of 
grace," or when wholly sanctified. 

The reader will now see the letters P. U. E. — 
to pass under the rod. Also the letters C. 0. N"., 
meaning Consecration; as well as the letters P. N. T., 
which stand for our Pentecost; for we have explicit 
directions to "wait for the promise of the Father/' 
in Luke 24 : 29 ; in Acts 1:5-8; and in Acts 2:1, 2. 
What the Church of to-day needs most is increased 
emphasis on "the expectation of the Pentecost of 

62 



FIKST EOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

fire and power." If we, as laymen and ministers, 
stop short of living and teaching the importance of 
the second work of grace, we may expect to be com- 
pelled to witness the sad spectacle of the spiritual 
dearth which too often ends in spiritual coldness and 
death among our young Christians. Negligence on 
our part in this particular phase of the spiritual life 
is contrary to God's will and interferes with His 
plan of getting rid of the devil's first mortgage, 
which he places on every soul as long as the Chris- 
tian lives with a seed of sin in his heart. The devil 
has sown in the soil of the soul the seeds of sin, 
and we are grieving the Holy Spirit when we for 
any cause fail to surrender to Him for cleansing, or 
fail in our teaching or preaching to emphasize the 
great need of the "Pentecostal baptism." How sad 
the Holy Spirit must be when His mouthpieces are 
dumb — His teachers and preachers — on this impor- 
tant subject ! But you may ask, ''Why do they not 
speak out? Why are they dumb?" Sad enough is 
the cause; and that is, they have not obeyed the in- 
junction, "Tarry in Jerusalem until ye are endued 
with power from on high." Many have obeyed and 
entered into this blissful state ; many others have not, 
and some have lost their bright experience because 
of the coldness of the Church. After preaching and 
testifying for a season they have failed to see the 
results they hoped for, lost their zeal, and often, 
through inaction in definite work and testimony, 
have gradually parted with their buoyant faith, and 
settled down into a low condition of spiritual life 

63 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

and action. In spiritual as in carnal warfare, the 
more we use our armor the brighter it will shine. 
If God cleanses and fills and keeps us by His divine 
power, we glorify Him in announcing the fact to 
others. It is not boasting nor taking honor on our- 
selves when we tell what the Lord is doing in and 
for us by His indwelling Spirit. No; bless His 
holy Name, He is sending His treasure to us by the 
Holy Ghost! (John 16:14.) 

For a wise purpose God sees fit to give us His 
grace by degrees as we comprehend our needs. The 
first step for the sinner is to feel his sinfulness in 
the sight of his God, which brings him *into the 
knowledge of his undone or lost state, makes per- 
ceptible his poverty of spirit, and he reaches out for 
that supply of life that he fails to find in himself, 
and which, through repentance toward God the Fa- 
ther and faith in his Lord and Savior, brings con- 
version and regeneration. When brought into the 
knowledge of inward bondage to carnality, he is led 
onward, and seeks the power that will break that 
bondage. Consecration for the baptism of the Holy 
Ghost with His fire of cleansing and energizing 
brings the heavenly influence symbolized by the dove. 
On the "highway of holiness" the way has been 
cleared of all ravenous beasts; no lion is on the path 
to intercept the successful, continuous progress heav- 
enward on the destined highway. What is the mean- 
ing of the language, "The lions are chained ? What 
are the lions and beasts on the Christian's highway 
but the evil passions in the soul? — the lions of self- 

64 



FIKST EOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

will, and the ferocious beasts of dark thoughts that 
arise in an unguarded moment? "When we would 
do good, evil is present" to hinder; and when we 
are crossed in our Church work or in dealing with 
our neighbors, there is uprising and rebellion in the 
heart, that causes us to show "the white feather" of 
cowardice or the double nature in some way that is 
not becoming in a true Christian. As professor, we 
feel condemned, but are too self-willed to confess our 
faults. The wordly people at once pronounce our 
course an evidence of hypocrisy. They lose faith in 
the Christian character at large, failing to recognize 
the truth that there is a dual nature in the persons 
condemned and that they have not attained singleness 
of soul by the cleansing process. 

But the highway of holiness is a road from which 
the wild beasts and lions of evil thoughts and passions 
have been cast out. The dwellers thereon are no 
longer self-willed or ferocious as lions, but are meek 
as lambs; and will bear offenses quietly an£ serenely 
that otherwise would set them wild. 

I must say right here, dear reader, that in my 
experience as a minister of the gospel most of the 
trouble I have had with my parishioners has been 
from those who were not very spiritual. A great 
deal of the anxiety and misery in the Church and 
hindrance in the building up of the people in holy 
living, has arisen from the conduct of those who, for 
some reason, have not in passing under the rod, suc- 
ceeded in crucifying the old self -nature. That nature 
remains, ever ready to exert itself when provoked. 
5 65 



STEPS IN THE CHEISTIAN LIFE. 

But praise the Lord for those who have counted the 
cost and paid the price in having self-will crucified, 
and have found in return the pure white life, which 
is peacefully flowing as a river. These dwell in the 
heavenly guest chamber of the "Triune God/' made 
ready by the presence of the Third Person in the 
Holy Trinity. 

I wish to say, for the glory of God, that I have 
been in meetings where the members were of one 
mind and one accord as to this blessing, and there 
was such manifest power present, that you could not 
help but preach; if you would only open your mouth, 
He was there to fill it. 

But what a contrast in other congregations, whom 
I have been called upon to teach ! There was present 
an evident spirit of holding back and refusing to 
accept the high spiritual doctrine so extreme that 
you could apparently feel the resistance. It was so 
manifestly cold that it required all the soul power 
you could bring to bear to aid you in prayer or in 
preaching. The Spirit demands human souls, and 
mind and will, as channels through which to operate 
in order to reach and teach other lives. 

The Word says, "The path of the just shineth 
more and more until the perfect day/' which is the 
natural result of traveling directly toward a great 
light. As the saints travel on this highway of holi- 
ness there will be more and more of God's light 
shining down into their minds and souls, that they 
may "grow in grace and in the knowlege of our Lord 
and Savior Jesus Christ." (John 16: 13, 14.) And 

66 



FIEST BOAD— SIN, SINNING. 

why? Because the soul's disability being removed it 
is in a condition to grow and develop and bear fruit 
as it could not do while under the cramped and 
bound condition of the sin nature. The life that 
has been cleansed and filled with the Spirit of God 
is ready for death so far as the nature or quality of 
the soul is concerned, but has not been matured 
through growth. Hence it is in a condition to grow, 
or to die or pass away, as the Lord sees fit to act. 

At the end of this highway the reader will see 
the letters E. X. 0., which stands for an Exodus or 
a passing out of this life or realm into the one beyond 
death. There will be no conscious death there, as the 
sting of death, which is sin, has been extracted, and 
all that is needed is for the Lord to call the spirit 
from its tenement of clay to a home enduring and 
eternal with the Lord who redeemed it "from the 
foundation of the world." Instead of a death angel, 
a reception community of angels from heaven will 
be there to convey the spirit to its heavenly home 
prepared for all those who love His appearing. 

"Faith, mighty Faith, the promise sees, 
And claims the victory won ; 
Laughs at impossibilities, 
And cries, It shall be done." 

— John Wesley. 



67 



STEPS m THE CHBISTIAN LIFE. 

MY FAVORITE POEM. 

|" Sunset and evening star, 
And one clear call for me ! 
And may there be no moaning of the bar, 
"When I pull out to sea ; 

" But such a tide as moving seems asleep, 
Too full for sound and foam, 
When that which drew from out the boundless deep 
Turns again home. 

" Twilight and evening bell 
And after that the dark ; 
And may there be no sadness of farewell, 
When I embark ! 

"For tho' from out our bourne of time and place 
The flood may bear me far, 
I hope to see my Pilot face to face 
When I have crossed the bar." 

— Tennyson. 



68 



Part HI. 
SOME TRUTHS COMPARED. 

Holiness is purity, and may not be "maturity." 

Justification is a state, and sanctification is an- 
other state. 

Holiness prepares for freedom in the Kingdom of 
God here, and the Kingdom of heaven hereafter. 

God was not mistaken when He said, "Be ye 
holy, for I am holy ;" but the man is mistaken when 
he thinks he can live a true Christian life without 
obeying that command. 

Conversion is clearing up accumulated interest. 

Holiness is lifting the mortgage. 

Conversion ushers into God's waiting room. 

Holiness brings us into the guest chamber of the 
Holy Ghost. 

Conversion brings us into a new relation to the 
Lord. 

Sanctification clears up that relation. 

Consecration is man's part ; sanctification is God's 
part. 

Conversion brings us into the holy place. 

Sanctification brings us into the Holy of Holies. 
69 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 
SERMON ON CONSECRATION. 

(This paper was written in a hurry, and was read before the 
Preachers' Meeting in Eaton, Ohio, in 1904.) 

In the beginning of the Christian era there was 
held a Pentecost. In the first chapter of Acts, eighth 
verse, it is stated: "Ye shall receive power, after 
that the Holy Ghost is come upon you and ye shall be 
witnesses unto Me, both in Jerusalem and in all 
Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts 
of the earth." In Acts 2 : 1 we read, "And when 
the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all 
with one accord in one place," waiting and expecting 
something to occur, as they had fulfilled their part of 
a moral obligation, and at the "third hour of the day, 
the hour of the morning sacrifice," and which was 
soon afterward established as the morning hour of 
prayer by the Christian Church, at this notable hour 
God honored not only the hour itself, but His people 
who had accepted the conditions according to His 
appointment, and fulfilled, together with Job's 
prophecy, the completion of their Lord and Master's 
promise, that they should "tarry in Jerusalem until 
they were endued with power from on high." How 
often had He spoken to them, while still with them, 
of their relation to the Holy Ghost, and the future 
work of the Church in its onward conquest of the 
world. And it was gloriously fulfilled and plainly 
demonstrated in the speaking with tongues on that 
memorable morning in the upper room, and in the 
change in the lives and active work of the apostles. 

70 



SOME TETITHS COMPARED. 

Paul wrote to the Corinthian Church in his first 
letter, third chapter, first to third verses, "He speaks 
unto them as to babes, not able to eat strong meat, 
but still feeding on milk when they should be eating 
meat." In the third verse he gives the reason for this 
slowness of growth, and the hindering cause was the 
presence of carnality. He writes to the Thessalo- 
nians, inciting them to a holy life (1 Thess. 5: 28), 
"I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body 
be preserved blameless unto His coming." In the 
twenty-fourth verse he shows who is to do the work, 
"Faithful is He who calleth you, who also will do 
it." I refer to these quotations, not to instruct my 
brethren, but to call attention to the subject under 
consideration. 

There was a Pentecost at the inauguration of the 
Christian Church, but do we have one nowadays? 
Or, in other words, what mode do we adopt to per- 
suade our people to seek for and expect a Pentecost in 
their souls? A brother, in his paper read at our last 
meeting, spoke of the means to be adopted to bring 
about the union of Churches, and he alluded to Pen- 
tecost as being one means. I agree, and consider this 
the key to all Christian union. 

But what are we, as ministers of the gospel of 
the risen Lord, doing along these lines? It is not 
a matter of vital importance what attitude our own 
Church has assumed in regard to this doctrine in the 
past; the all-important question rests with us as 
leaders, Are we teaching the doctrine of the Bible — 
full and free salvation; so that our people may be 

71 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

able to understand their privileges and take hold of 
the means that will be of the greatest possible benefit 
in helping them to build up Christian character? 
Do we deal too much in generalities, or do we deal 
in specifics and particulars as we should, that our 
young people will have an appetite created for spirit- 
ual food, and attain to the highest possible Christian 
grace ? 

Paul, in his letter to the Church at Eome, ex- 
horted them to make full consecration. (Ronh 12: 
1, 2.) This is a model we would all do well to study 
and appropriate in our Christian work as the means 
for each individual to meet the requirement for Pen- 
tecost. The question is asked, and it should be asked 
with the expectation of an answer to be understood, 
"What is sanctification ?" "What is consecration?" 
Often the same answer is given for each : sanctifica- 
tion is consecration, and vice versa. These answers 
are misleading; a theological view, setting aside an 
object from a common to a sacred use. Is that all? 
What is consecration? "0," one says, "that is sanc- 
tification." Is sanctification all of consecration, and 
is consecration all of sanctification? If so, we come 
short of the gold we had in view. 

The fact that these terms are misapplied is the 
occasion of much stumbling and often missing the 
blessing of Pentecost. As James says, "We ask, and 
receive not, because we ask amiss," and our people too 
often ask amiss because they do not ask intelligently. 
God is not a God of confusion, but a God of harmony. 

Paul calls the consecration a reasonable service. 
72 



SOME TKUTHS COMPAEED. 

Then what is consecration ? I will answer, It is man's 
part. It is sanctification in part only; not all or the 
whole, but man's part; and sanctification is God's 
part. The accepting of the sacrifice and pouring 
out the Pentecost baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire 
is God's part. The great trouble with so many sanc- 
tificationists of these days is, that only man's part is 
done, and God's part is neglected, and why? Just 
because the subject party has been misinformed, and 
does as he has been taught ; and that is, "0, just con- 
secrate once a month." He is taught, with this, "to 
look for nothing," and he receives what he looks for. 
"That is according to the Word, you know." I wish 
to say that this indefinite work is doing untold in- 
jury to our people and the Eedeemer's Kingdom. 
This monthly consecration is misleading to the 
younger people as well as to the older ones. 

Let us see how we consecrate: for a little closer 
walk with our Lord, for a little more power, for a 
little more love for Him. It should be made for all 
time and eternity, it should be made for all power, 
it should be made for all love. 

How does a monthly consecration look to some 
people and the Lord? Let us see; suppose I am a 
laborer looking for work, and I come to a farmer, 
and, on inquiry, find he needs a man. We finally 
come to an agreement for so much payment a month 
for six months. I go to work, and work for one 
month. At the end of that time I come to the farmer 
and tell him I wish to be rehired. What do you 
think that fanner would say? He would surely ask, 

73 



STEPS m THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

"What is the trouble?" "0," I would answer, "I 
thought we would renew our contract." He would 
have reason to think something was wrong; either I 
had been working part of the time for some one else, 
or had been in company with an enemy of his. 

Do you not see how unreasonable the monthly 
service must be in the eyes of the All-wise God ? He 
has taught us that He is our Father; so let us ad- 
dress Him as such in an intelligent, definite way, 
and ask in plain words for the things we desire and 
need. 

Brethren, we are appointed as under-shepherds. 
Be sure we can not lead cur flocks to any field or 
pasture that we have not ourselves passed over. 
Neither can we safely lead over stony cliffs the weak 
ones and the lambs until we have gone over that 
ground ourselves. Let us then present convincingly 
consecration as man's part, coupled with faith, and 
sanctification as God's part in the lesson of Christian 
progress, and when the two meet in one we are wholly 
the Lord's for service and sacrifice. 

SOME UNREASONABLE THINGS. 

For a poor, weak mortal man to take the name 
of God in vain, whom he will meet as his Judge. 

For a man to think he will gain anything by de- 
liberately working on the Sabbath day ; for he breaks 
the law of health, which is God's law. 

For persons to think that they can prosper unless 
they obey the twin laws, Industry and Economy. 

74 



SOME TRUTHS COMPAEED. 

To build a barn and stable without building an 
approach to the stable door. 

To build a device to attract lightning in the top 
of a barn, by plating a steel track for the forked 
trolley to run on, without adding a conductor to 
carry the current to the ground. 

To expect friends without showing a disposition 
to be friendly. 

To endure heat or cold all the week in labor, 
and to squander the hard-earned wages before 
Monday morning. 

Two things the youth in his prime is supplied 
with, of which there is a want in the decline of 
life, — Time and Energy. 

Many need to learn the worth of Time and 
Money. 

SOME SAYINGS. 

What are some of the signs of degeneration of 
the human race ? An increase in the consumption 
of whisky and tobacco. 

Why are some mothers like a bear ? One will 
"spoil " her child to death ; the other would squeeze 
it to death. 

Some reasons why man should not use tobacco. 
First, it grows naturally as a luxury for big, green 
worms. Second, if the Creator intended man to make 
a tobacco press of his mouth, He surely would have 
provided a receptacle for the juice that would prevent 
the user from spitting it on the floor of offices and on 
the sidewalks. Third, if the Lord had intended man 

75 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

to make a furnace of his mouth, He would not have 
shaped it so unlike other furnaces in having the 
smoke escape at the mouth of the fire-box into the 
faces of those who are near, but surely would have 
attached a smoke stack in the back part of the head. 

What is the difference between the former Negro 
slave of the South and millions of American citizens ? 
The one was ruled by a taskmaster in the form of a 
man; the other by a glass of whisky and a roll or 
plug of tobacco. 

If the common herd of men were paid back in 
their own coin this year (as it is Leap Year,) the 
women would tell them to quit their deviltry and 
let the women take the reigns of government for 
awhile and show them how it would please them to 
stay at home and take care of the children, and look 
on while the women were smoking, chewing, drinking, 
and swearing, etc. 

Why are some of the boys to-day like some men? 
One class break their parents' laws, and then their 
hearts; the other break Uncle Sam's laws, and then, 
placed where they ought to be, break the jail bars. 

What causes so much trouble in the homes of 
to-day? One parent scolds, and the other pets. A 
lack of government on the part of both parents 
Moral : "Spare the rod and spoil the child." 

Some men read the daily papers, but never the 
Book of books. 

Some men study books, but do not study men. 

Some men take great interest in books and in 
the man-self. 

76 



SOME TBUTHS COMPAEED. 

Some men follow worldly masters, which leads 
to heartaches; but if they would follow the great 
Master of men He would lead them to heart rest. 

Some men follow the field plow who ought to be 
using the gospel plow. 

Why are the failures in the race of life so numer* 
ous? Simply because so many fail to find their 
calling. Others fail to work at it when they do 
find it. 

The lessons God taught Moses apply to other min- 
isters; that is, they need a training from God equal 
to that of the schools of theology. 

"Why is man unlike God? One sees what seems 
to be in man ; the other sees what is really in man. 

Why is the call of God and the call of the Con- 
ference unlike in some instances ? God says, "Go and 
preach the Gospel;" and the Conference says, "Stay 
with the stuff." But God compels the elected serv- 
ants to go in spite of this protestation. 

Many people get in a hurry in the race of life, and 
buy automobiles or aeroplanes, and travel so fast that 
they soon come to the end of the race — by accident. 
The man of moderate pace will travel farther and 
safer by traveling longer. 

Some good men are learning that whisky makes 
business for the whisky dealer, but not for legitimate 
industries. 



77 



Part IV. 

SERMONS. 

THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF THE 
BIBLE IN CIVIL GOVERNMENT. 

The Bible stands alone in human literature in its 
elevated conception of manhood as to character and 
conduct. It is the invaluable training book of the 
world, and no greater crime has been committed in 
this Nation than that legislative iniquity which cast 
out the Bible from the public school. 

It is not a question of creed, for the Bible is not 
a book of creeds. It is a question of far greater im- 
portance to this Government than any creed. It is 
not a question of Church, for no one branch of 
Church is essential, or requisite in any degree, to the 
ultimate triumph of the gospel of Christ. But the 
Bible is the standard, the only infallible guide for 
earth's erring millions; and the sacred rays of love, 
peace, truth, and purity that beam and radiate and 
glow from its sacred pages are indispensable to the 
truest and highest and best uses, not only for the 
life that now is, but also for that which is to come. 

No creed should be taught in the public schools, 
78 



BIBLE m CIVIL GOVEKNMENT. 

and this Government should never be chargeable with 
the folly of contributing one cent of its public funds, 
municipal, State, or national, to any sectarian uses 
whatever. A Church that can not exist and carry 
on its work without aid from the public treasury, 
ought to die — and the sooner the better. But this 
Government can not afford to take from under its 
own magnificent superstructure the only infallible 
cornerstone upon which it rests. To do so is to give 
us a system of morality without religion, which must 
eventuate in agnosticism or atheism, or it will leave 
us a religion without morality, whose ultimate des- 
tiny is inquisitorial fires and all kinds of horrible 
butcheries. 

The one essential thing in civil government is 
religion. In fact, there can be no civil government 
without it, and the character of the religion deter- 
mines the character of the civil government, and 
gives tone and color to all of its interests. In our 
study of economies the fatal mistake we have made 
is in failing to study the economic value of religions. 
There is no question so vital to our country as this, 
and to longer ignore it is to do untold discredit to 
ourselves. We have spent much time in discussing 
tariff, free trade, free silver, the gold standard, and 
other questions which are simply incidental, and have 
left out the only questions that are vital and real and 
of permanent utility. There are a number of ques- 
tions which directly affect the Government, both in its 
individual and collective capacity, that depend wholly 
and solely upon the subject of religion. Some of these 

79 



STEPS m THE CHEISTIAN LIFE. 

are wages, intellectual development and progress, 
health, longevity, and prevalence of crime. These 
things are vital, and we propose to discuss them with 
a view to show that religion has an economic value. 

First, as to wages. Wages do not depend directly 
upon high or low tariff laws, nor on the money 
standard, but they do depend upon the system of 
religion which governs the country. Take the wages 
of a farm laborer — an unskilled one will best suit 
the illustration, for the rule is that whatever is the 
hire of a common laborer is the bottom standard. 
Multiply his pay one and a half times, and you obtain 
the rate for factory operatives; double it, and you 
have the pay of the miner and carpenter; treble it, 
and you have the wages of the skilled machinist. 
This scale requires but little change in any part of 
the world. 

Eeligion governs wages everywhere. Japan, 
China, and India are pagan countries, differing geo- 
graphically, in natural resources, and in language. 
There is nothing here to bring about a regulation of 
wages to a uniform scale; but we find that the pay 
in these pagan countries is ten cents a day for com- 
mon labor, and we are compelled to attribute this fact 
to the religious condition of the people. We come 
next to the three Mohammedan countries, Persia, 
Syria, and Turkey. These countries are not nearly 
so well situated in natural resources or climate as 
the first-mentioned pagan nations; but we find these 
nations using a uniform religion, though different 
in other ways. The wages here, however, are double 

80 



BIBLE IN CIVIL GOVEKNMENT. 

those of the pagan lands. The laborers are paid 
twenty cents a day. Their religion is in some degree 
above the pagan. They are not idol worshipers, 
and we thus account for the difference in wages. We 
now come to the two countries whose religion is the 
Greek Catholic, Greece and Bussia, where a laborer 
receives twenty-five cents a day. Why this advance 
in wages above the Mahommedan lands ? Because the 
religion is better, as the Church claims to believe in 
Christ. Their form of worship, however, is ritualistic, 
and vital religion is at a very low ebb ; yet it is better 
than Mohammedanism, and the wages are better. 
The two Greek countries are unlike in climate, in lo- 
cation, in natural resources, and in intellectual ad- 
vantages, as Greece taught the world to read and 
write; but the wages and the religion are the same. 

Eoman Catholic countries pay the workingman 
about thirty-seven cents a day, and all fall below 
fifty cents in wages. But if we compare them with 
each other — for instance, Ireland with Italy — though 
the latter has had the advantage in location, in 
climate, in natural resurces, and in intellectuality 
for centuries, we find the religion and the wages 
about the same in each. 

Protestant countries all pay from fifty cents to 
one dollar per day to the common workman. Holland 
pays fifty cents; Denmark, fifty cents; Scotland, 
sixty-two cents; England, sixty-five cents; Canada, 
eighty cents ; America, one dollar. Ireland and Scot 1 
land lie side by side, and the former has advantages 
over the latter in soil and in other points of interest ; 
6 81 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

but Scotland, under Protestant religion, pays twice 
the wages that Ireland does under the Koman Catho- 
lic form. Mexico has many advantages over Canada 
in soil, climate, and location ; but the latter pays three 
times the wages of the former. 

So we might proceed with our comparisons and 
they would terminate in the same conclusion, that 
whatever the dissimilarities in different lands, if the 
religion is the same, the wages are the same. Mul- 
tiply the wages of pagan countries by two, and you 
have the wages of the Mohammedan countries; mul- 
tiply by two and a half, and you have the wages of the 
Greeks; multiply by three and a half, and you have 
the wages of the Eoman Catholic lands ; and by seven 
multiplied, you will have the wages of the Protestants. 
When we have observed these conditions, we will be 
compelled to decide that religion influences the wages 
of a country from fair to good, according to the 
character of the religion. 

Eight Catholic countries show an average of fifty- 
nine per cent of illiterary, and eight Protestant 
countries give an average of four per cent. 

HEALTH AND LONGEVITY. 

The birth rate in all pagan, Mohammedan, and 
Greek countries little more than exceeds the death 
rate, and it takes one hundred and forty years for 
the Catholic countries to double their population; 
only sixty-two years is required for the Protestant 
countries to do the same. If the Bible does so much 

82 



BIBLE m CIVIL GOVEENMENT. 

for the nations that keep it in the hands of the 
people, why banish it from the public schools? The 
Catholic and Jewish spirit is the greatest enemy of 
the Bible and the public school, and in placing the 
Book in the hands of the people. (See Father J. J. 
Crowley's book on the subject.) As an important 
factor in molding the life, education is almost uni- 
versally denied to woman. 

The Greek Church, with its ritualism, has brought 
to its devotions nothing but a heritage of ignorance 
and superstition. Mighty Athens, with the darken- 
ing influence of the Greek Church, has only sixty- 
three of every thousand of her children in school, 
and Eussia has but nine in a thousand similarly 
advantaged. 

We should stand by our public institutions, un- 
falteringly, in every way and everywhere; an( i that 
means not only by word of mouth, but by the right 
hand of power at the polls. We should rise in our 
manhood and banish our greatest foe, the saloon, 
and reinstate the Bible in the home, where it belongs, 
not as an ornament, but to be studied. Its precepts 
should be practiced in our daily lives; it should be 
placed in the public schools, where our children may 
become imbued with its ennobling thoughts. The 
course we are now pursuing is no credit to us as a 
Christian Nation. The Bible represents two great 
ideas or principles. One is a pure, spiritual Chris- 
tianity ; the other, civil liberty. Whatsoever is found 
in the economic, social, or ethical development of the 
civil government is simply the logical outgrowth of 

83 



STEPS m THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

the religious system prevailing in the particular 
country. 

Note. — There have been a few changes made 
in some of those countries mentioned in our sermon, 
through the influence of evangelistic efforts, since 
these statistics were compiled — by Wiley J. Phillips, 
of Los Angeles, [see cut], editor of "The Southern 
Call" — Prohibition paper. 

THE MODERN DANCE. 

A DANGEROUS INSTITUTION. 

"Of two thousand five hundred abandoned women 
in San Francisco," Professor La Flori says, "I can 
safely say that three- fourths of them were led to 
their downfall through the dance hall." John H. 
Mickey, a distinguished governor of the State of Ne- 
braska, in an interview said: "Yes, it is the truth, 
I do not favor dancing. I declined to have an in- 
auguration ball. I was not brought up to believe 
in dancing. My Church, the Methodist Episcopal, 
is against that form of amusement. I have taught 
my children — four girls and three boys — that it is 
an indulgence which they should avoid, and I could 
not very well consent to an inaugural ball in my 
honor and be consistent with the practice and teach- 
ings of my life and my home. 

"As a form of amusement or indulgence, I believe 
that dancing is one of the greatest social evils with 
which we have to contend. It is not an innocent 

84 



BIBLE IN CIVIL GOVEKNMENT. 

amusement. It is the cause of the downfall of more 
girls and women than any other thing which is per- 
mitted within the pale of the social life of to-day. 

"It was surprising the number of letters I received 
from leading physicians all over the country com- 
mending my course. They are the ones who are 
called upon to know the sad results which follow in 
the wake of the dancing evil. They know the sorrows 
which come to young women and their families as a 
result of the excitement of the ballroom, but it is a 
lamentable phase of social conditions that the women 
must bear the burden of their errors, while the men, 
to whom the blame belongs, go scot free and unhu- 
miliated. 

"The woman bears the disgrace throughout her 
life, but the man — well, he has no thought or care 
for the future/' 

Mr. T. A. Faulkner, author of the book, "From 
Ballroom to Hell/' began dancing at the ager of twelve 
years. He spent most of his time until recently in 
the dancing academies and parlors. He says: "For 
the last six years of my dancing career I was a 
teacher of dancing, and for several years held the 
championship on the Pacific Coast in fancy and 
round dancing. I am also the author of many of the 
round dances which are the popular fads of the day. 
Since my conversion from a dancing master and a 
servant of the Evil One to an earnest Christian and 
a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ, the question has 
been repeatedly asked me, 'Is there harm in danc- 
ing?' Many Church members and professing Chris- 

85 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

tians who dance think there is no harm in select 
dancing, yet it is the root of the whole matter. Who 
can stop those who indulge the fascination from 
going to the public dance ?" 

Parents who allow their children to dance at home 
can not hold them from going to other places where 
the dance is in vogue. They will even pretend to go 
to Church, and will remain there long enough to 
hear the text, which they are expected to report after- 
ward at home; then out of the house of the Lord 
they go to visit a dance hall or a five or ten cent show. 
Parents who have been called upon to give up two of 
their three children by death, have one daughter left 
whom they love better than their own lives, and are 
anxious that she should grow up in refinement. 
Some professor in the vicinity advertises the opening 
of a private dancing academy. They think here is a 
chance to improve their daughter, and they send her 
to the professor for instruction. Thus the fondness 
for dancing is formed and becomes a habit. It is 
estimated that two-thirds of the girls who have fallen 
can attribute their condition to the dance. Is not 
this taking too much risk in order to spend a few 
evenings of pleasure? How many men look for a 
wife among habitual dancers? 

The health is injured on these festal occasions by 
the wearing of short sleeves and low-necked dresses 
in the winter. Are not disease and crime on the in- 
crease? There is a cause. The crude folly of many 
parents in the education of their children is somewhat 
to blame. 

86 



BIBLE IN CIVIL GOVEKNMENT. 

Is there any wonder that so many fall while a 
multitude of professional hawks are seeking their 
prey ? A young lady from New England came to Los 
Angeles for one year for the benefit of the climate. 
She was carried away by the dance epidemic; cap- 
tured by the professorship of the "light fantastic" 
through the indifference of her pastor. There is an 
organized traffic in girls in this "land of the free and 
home of the brave;" more properly, the land of the 
bound and the cowards. 

The dance hall and the white slave trade could 
not be carried on as it is without liquor. If a city but 
once shuts off the brandy and wine traffic, the cry 
comes, "We must have the saloon, or our business is 
doomed !" 

The common dance hall is usually located near a 
saloon or an accommodating drugstore. 

Who is the worse sinner in the dance — the man 
or the girl? The girl suffers the shame of the sin 
if guilty, and is forever branded, while the scoundrel 
of a man goes free and unpunished. 

Vile men attend other assemblies, but in no other 
place are such liberties taken in public as in the dance 
hall. 

The money received from such sources will tor- 
ture like a canker the soul of the receiver, if he gets 
his due. 

Where do most drunkards obtain their first drink ? 

Where do the gamblers play their first game ? 

Where do three-fourths of the women who to-day 
are living a life of shame first submit to the atten- 

87 



STEPS IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

tions of the sons and man of the street? Faulkner, 
the reformed, answer! 

The first drink was a social glass. The first game 
of cards was "just a little social game." 

Three-fourths of the outcast women had a man's 
arm placed around the waist when they were young 
girls in "just a social dance." 

The lot of a Negress in an equatorial forest is not 
a very happy one; but what may be said for one cer- 
tain beautiful orphan girl in our fair land, in com- 
parison? The story is a common one. 

A Catholic priest's statement in regard to the 
confession of some who had fallen from a modest 
position in home and society informs us that of those 
who were degraded, eighteen out of twenty started 
downward in the dance hall. 

The attitude taken by many ministers and profess- 
ing Christians has a great deal to do with the atti- 
tude of the young toward the dance hall. 

It is the cause, and not the effect, we need to re- 
gard in seeking a remedy for the evil. Dam them at 
the source, the dance hall, and its fascinating ally, 
the modern dance. 

Would you choose a saloon for your boy or a dance 
hall for your daughter, giving the dance hall far the 
preference? Eemember, safe testimony informs us 
that ten men are saved from the saloon where one 
woman is saved from the dance hall. 



88 



BIBLE IN CIVIL GOVEKNMENT. 
LET US REASON TOGETHER. 

Isaiah 1: 18; Luke 13: 1-3. 

"Come now, and let us reason together, saith the 
Lord : though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as 
white as snow ; though they be red like crimson, they 
shall be as wool." 

"I tell you, Nay; but except ye repent, ye shall 
all likewise perish." 

"The sorrow of this world worketh death; but 
godly sorrow for sin worketh repentance, that need 
not be repented of." A sorrow that brings laughter 
and peace; you are glad that you were sorry. 

True repentance is more than turning over a 
new leaf. It is more than merely believing with the 
mind, and more than being baptized with water. 
"With the heart man believeth unto righteousness; 
but with the mouth confession is made unto salva- 
tion." It is not a graduation of righteousness, here 
a lopping off one evil habit, and there another. It 
is not a refining proce:3 after death. It is more 
than a reformation of the mind. It affects the soul, 
working out through the acts of the body. If only 
believing that Christ is the Son of God will save a 
man, why not a devil? — for devils believed and 
testified that Christ was the Son of God, and was to 
be their Judge. 

If merely baptism with water saves, it is an easy 
matter to be saved. If an abstract faith saves, or 
good intentions, or sincere desires, Christ would not 
have had to die to save, but Christ did have to give 

89 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

His life to ransom the world, and it takes a living, 
active faith in the atonement to bring salvation to 
the soul. What does a physician stand for? Some 
may say, "I will not believe in anything that I do 
not understand" Do you understand medical sci- 
ence? Do you understand a grain of wheat or corn, 
and why the stem will push up to the surface of the 
ground, and the roots turn downward deeper and 
deeper into the soil? Do you understand why cer- 
tain food will nourish one person, and act as poison 
upon another? Do you understand why the same 
grass in a pasture will grow wool on a sheep's 
back, and hair on the back of a hog, cow, or horse; 
and why the same grass forms pork, beef, or mutton ? 

Why does a physician succeed in his profession, 
and a minister find such small results from his la- 
bors ? Simply because the prescription of the former 
is closely attended to, and the recommendations and 
warnings of the latter are lightly observed, and often 
turned aside with disdain, and his advice is thrown 
to the winds. But when death comes the friends of 
the deceased like to have the minister say good things 
about the dead, and convince the assembled friends 
that they have gone straight to glory, even though 
their near relatives can not speak so favorably. 

Let us look at life exactly as it is. If you plead 
ignorance in reference to the thing to be done in the 
case of a wound, and trust solely to the treatment of 
your physician to cure your injury, then why not 
take the prescription of your minister, whom you 
know in his life and character, instead of listening 

90 



BIBLE m CIVIL GOVEKNMENT. 

to the traveling agent of some new religious fad, 
who is going up and down the land making all rough 
places seem smooth to the worldly mind? Let us 
look at life from the logical side. Suppose I, or any 
other minister, should be disposed to make the way 
of eternal life so very easy to reach; as follows, "0, 
just turn over a new leaf; just reform a little and 
join the Church, and be baptized; and if then it is 
inconvenient to live in strict conformity to a right 
life, you are not compelled to do so." Then if you 
were not where you should be in the hour of death, 
"you will have another chance after death," accord- 
ing to the soothing belief of the Eestitutionist. 

Now, suppose some responsible, respected minister 
should feel disposed to preach this easy-going doc- 
trine, and a class of people should feel disposed to 
accept it; not a foolish supposition, as human nature 
is ever looking about for smooth sailing on life's 
rough sea; and then, when death comes to them, 
suppose they expect to pass through the pearly gates 
into the heavenly city; and suppose, again, these peo- 
ple find that they have been deceived, and instead 
of holy angels waiting for them at death's door to 
bear their spirits to the bosom of the Father of light 
and happiness, the angels of Satan are waiting — 
not to bear them gently away, but to drag them down 
to the region of the damned, a place prepared for 
the devil and his angels. Here they will find that 
there is no refining associations, but that the com- 
panionship is such that with them it will be impos- 
sible to reform or to be purified, even if there were 

91 



STEPS m THE CHEISTIAN LIFE. 

any desire in that way. There may truly be a strong 
wish to be set free from this place of torment; but 
it is a realm in which hope never enters, and despair 
is ever present. 

Now, when they find that they have been de- 
ceived, they will not only curse the preacher who 
misled them, but they will curse themselves for be- 
ing so foolish as to submit to the deception, when by 
a careful examination they could have discovered that 
the sayings of the gospel were a safe and sure guide. 
Their own earthly experience would then have glori- 
fied them. 

But, alas ! how many now living are procrasti- 
nating ! They say by their actions that they have no 
time to prove the Scriptures. Their time is taken 
up with the things of the world. They burn the 
midnight oil over a game of cards or a ten-cent 
novel, or while away the hours in a ballroom, or 
simply in indifference and neglect of the interest of 
their soul's welfare. These forms of negligence help 
to seal their final doom in the realm of the damned. 

They have no leisure for serious thought, no room 
for Christ, though often He has approached them 
through His Spirit and knocked at the door of their 
hearts. They have turned Him out into the cold, 
though those pierced hands have carried blessings to 
their households in wardrobe and larder and a hun- 
dred temporalities. 

Can the Father forgive them? Often He has 
witnessed the baseness of their conduct ; but a view 
of that pierced side has withheld justice from being 

92 



BIBLE IN CIVIL GOVERNMENT. 

meted out to their souls and from suspending for- 
ever the beating of their hearts. Yet, when called 
and admonished, they say, "No, not now/' and so 
continue to procrastinate. But they are being car- 
ried onward by the wheels of Time nearer and nearer 
the dreadful hour when He says, "I will laugh when 
your calamity comes, and when you call I will not 
hear/' Should this not be the outcome when He 
has called so many times for entrance, and the door 
has been shut in His face, and He has been forced 
to take sorrowful leave of His own possessions, pur- 
chased in that now forgotten day by the suffering and 
the death on the cross? 

A young lady gave her soul for the privilege of 
one dance, but never reached the dance-hall. 

A young man said, "My feet are slipping into 
hell, and you, father, are to blame, because you never 
spoke to me in behalf of my soul." 

Moody tells of a "man who, while very sick, 
vowed to God that, if He would heal him, he would 
give Him his heart and serve Him, but when he was 
brought to a state of convalescence he refused to 
fulfill his vow, and soon died without hope." Moody 
says that the heavens seemed like brass over his head 
as he attempted to pray for this dying man; and in 
this dark hour he requested Mr. Moody to pray for 
his wife and children, but not for himself, "f or it was 
no use." 

A backslider, a mother, in Pemberton, Colorado, 
went down to death with the testimony that she was 
lost. 

93 



STEPS m THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. 

A man in Woodland Park, same State, died with 
the sad words on his lips, "I am going to hell." 

The words of Tom Paine, Voltaire, Hume, and 
others — a great multitude — who have left testimony 
of their condition in the last hour, as well as the 
multiplied thousands and millions who have had no 
chance to leave a parting word, but have died with- 
out hope, — these have all given to the living a warn- 
ing lesson; they tell the sorrowful story of having 
too long fought against God and sinned against His 
light. 

"Let us reason together," if we are sinners, and 
we all have been by nature, if we are not now; but 
"if our sins are as scarlet, they shall be white as 
snow; and if they are red as crimson, they shall be 
as wool," if we will but repent of them, and confess 
to God, and believe in the virtue of the atonement. 

"What more could He do than He has done ?" 

"The sorrow of this world worketh death; but 
godly sorrow for sin worketh repentance: a repent- 
ance that need not be repented of," whenever we are 
glad that we repented of our sins. 

"He is risen !" The whole city was arousing itself 
out of a troubled sleep. A sigh of trouble. Wonder 
came up from the heart of a nation ; every face wore 
a question; every conscience trembled; every eye 
bore a startled look. Awe settled upon the people, 
and, though they did not know why, yet they felt 
that something awful, wonderful in its grandeur, was 
about to happen. They are soon to hear the words 
first proclaimed by the angel, then taken up by the 

94 



BIBLE IN CIVIL GOVERNMENT. 

three weeping women who early found their way to 
the tomb, with spices, to finish the work only par- 
tially done on the eve of the preparation; but now 
they take up the strain : "He is risen ; He is not in 
the tomb. We saw an angel, and he told us He is 
risen. Behold the place where they laid Him." This 
is the climax that Christ looked forward to as the 
vision of His sufferings was continually before Him, 
the recompense of reward — Eesurrection morn. 

Jesus was not only greater than the temple, but 
greater than death and the tomb. "See where He 
lay." A real resurrection; not a mystic, not a spir- 
itual, but a real physical resurrection. Not speaking 
metaphysically; not Christ risen in your heart, not 
in your faith, not in your hope, not in your life, not 
merely a subjective ideality, but it was an objective 
reality. If the fact of the resurrection could be done 
away with, Christ power would be done in the world. 
It will not do to look upon the grave as the end of 
life or close of being. An empty grave tells a differ- 
ent story, brings into view a new life, a new world. 
Life is greater than death. Man is mightier than 
the tomb. Life passed through the grave. Come and 
see the power of an endless life. Death can not de- 
stroy it; the grave can not imprison it. Come and 
see the emptiness of the grave, and behold the abun- 
dance of the life of the Son of God, who has said 
that He came that they might have more abundant 
life. 

Son of God became the Son of man that the sons 
of men might become the sons of God, life more 

95 



STEPS IN THE CHKISTIAN LIFE. 

mighty than death, life greater than the grave, life 
endless, supreme, divine, everlasting. 

Angels* voices were the first to proclaim the birth 
of Christ; angels first to proclaim He has risen; an- 
gels first to proclaim His second coming. Kesurrec- 
tion a pledge to the race ; springtime a rosebud. 

"All power is given Me in heaven and in earth/' 
said Christ. When the last temptation is overcome, 
the last battle won, and the last wearer of the cross 
laid down his armor, then this old world's attention 
will be called to another scene — the final conquest of 
all ; then the trumpet of the Lord will sound, and the 
dead in Christ will hear His voice and come forth 
from their resting-places to look into their empty 
graves ; and afresh, as never before, will this message 
come to them: "Behold, where they laid Him! He 
is risen." We have risen. Behold, where we lay. 
Stand where prophecies are fulfilled. 

When the Son of God came forth from the grave 
He conquered two powers: death and men's hearts. 

Three wise men at the cradle manger. Three 
women at the grave. Who shall remove the stone? 
A King was born in Bethlehem. Heaven and earth 
met at the tomb. A King was dead in the tomb. He 
arose and ascended. 

The proof of the message, Jesus' words, "All 
hail ! All hail !" Let it go sounding down through 
the ages to the sorrowing hearts as they stand beside 
loved ones who are cold in death. The angel speaks, 
"They are not here; their spirits are gone." Christ 
all hail to a resurrection morn. 

96 



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